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This is a different Artist Series profile than any of the other ones I’ve done so far. Normally, you interview an amazing artist, learn about their childhood, their culture, the things that make them who they are. You dive into their beginnings in music/creativity, their influences, thoughts on AI, and what the future could look like. Add some quips, add some quotes, and voila, an artist profile.

I don’t want to do any of that for this one because I met someone whom I consider to buck the norms, to rebel, to challenge, to question. And it seems fucking lame to follow the same pattern with such a person. She goes by Portrait XO. I get to call her Rania.

This will be a stream of consciousness letter to a new friend. Read it if you want, or don’t. It’s not really for you anyways.

—o—

Rania,

I just dropped you off back at the stunning and most definitely haunted Internet Archive house in San Francisco and am just trying to collect all of my thoughts. We’ve been in contact, chatting on WhatsApp, sharing music and articles and podcasts that are helping us along the way for some time now. It all started with an interview.

An interview that I missed not once, not twice, but 5 times if memory serves. Life is dumb, I’m sorry for having to move our initial chat so many times. You were such a good sport about it, and it really helped in putting me at ease.

I’m sure you are aware of it, but I have social anxiety. I don’t really like meeting new people, at least past a certain depth. I LOVE interviewing and meeting creatives like yourself, don’t get me wrong; that’s why I started the Artist Series in the first place. But going any deeper than that is usually where I draw the line. 

Suffice it to say, I was nervous about meeting you. And was blown away when all that nervousness  melted in about 5 minutes. I think it was your vibe, your calming energy/presence, your cool computer screen background that looked like you were a nymph in a Willy Wonka-like forest. But really, it was just you.

Bowie and my Nine Inch Nails t-shirt and Portishead and Bjork (speaking of nymph fairies) and UK jungle and Quantum Mechanics and climate change and East LA culture with the tamales and OpenAI and rabbit holes.

Loads and loads of rabbit holes to explore like other possible worlds. I imagine these worlds exist, each and every one taking on a different tangent we covered in our 2 hours of chatting before your Berlin WiFi shat the bed.

^^ You look real cool here btw

I realized that I actually wanted to be your friend when we talked about everything and nothing for the first half hour of our supposed 45 minute interview. You just have this extremely likable and genuineness that is contagious.

It was cool hearing about your life growing up, learning to play piano at a high level, falling in love with jazz. Being pushed into conservatory mode, recognizing that piano was now something you didn’t want it to be in your life. Having the balls to change paths and not let people’s expectations become your reality.

BTW, WHO BUYS A ONE-WAY TICKET TO BERLIN for $150???

You’re crazy and brave and I love it.

I’ve really been enjoying playing with your custom audio model recently. I think it encapsulates your sound and people are going to dig it. Listening to your body of work that makes up WIRE had me thinking about all the interesting things people are going to create with it. And if they don’t create, I know I will because I already have!

I was saddened to learn about your friend’s passing. You’re never prepared for something like that, I know the feeling intimately. It had me thinking about our conversation on why we create in the first place. I believe it goes back to a very fundamental truth about being human, about what separates us from every other life form on earth: we create not only because we can, but because we need to.

In thinking of your friend that you lost, of all those that I’ve lost, of all those that have been lost, I found a gentle solace in recognizing that it is part of the deal we make with Mother Earth. One day, we will return this gift of life she has given us.

I made a track with your audio model called Cycles to encapsulate this feeling that I’m so poorly describing in the written form. Our shared love of Radiohead’s “Everything In Its Right Place” served as a sonic inspiration, while your model serves as the engine for my expression. It was an interesting exercise, since I haven’t created anything but random thoughts/snippets with Neutone’s models until now. I hope you enjoy the track and take pride in what we’ve built together in your Partner Model!

We had a pretty solid night I’d say! You got to experience a pretty mid Mexican spot by the ocean, hear all the tea from my volatile time at OpenAI, product design the next Neutone offering (lol, we’re on it) and laugh all the while. I’m still ruminating on our last ‘big’ topic of conversation, where we turned to AI and the creative fields.

It was inspiring hearing your vision for a symbiotic relationship between ‘man and machine’, one where artists are in control of their individuality through ownership via datasets, model training, likeness, licensing, etc. What we obviously DON’T want is for another ‘Spotify moment’ as you so aptly put it, one where a company swoops in, sets a standard that becomes legacy and canon, virtually impossible to undo and benefiting everyone more than the actual artists who are putting their lives into their works.

That’s dumb.

No. It’s beyond dumb. It’s actually insane that we’ve allowed this to happen.

It’s part of the reason I became disillusioned with OpenAI in the first place, their lack of transparency and shady ethics around model training, and generally within the AI goldrush that we’re in right now.

It’s what brought me to Neutone. We want to build this world. One where artists are in control, where consent is EXPLICIT and HONORED, where their piece of the pie is as big as possible. 

I don’t think I can fully express how excited we were to launch the entire Partner Model Series with you as the very first artist going live. We all talked about it internally that you completely embody the ethos of Neutone and hopefully of future artists as well. It is all very inspiring, I don’t really know what else to say about it. I’m just grateful for so many things right now.

The future we want to build is a LONG SHOT. Upending an existing structure as deeply rooted as the current paradigm where artists are taken advantage of by the music industry will be borderline impossible.

But we will try.

Because, as the greatest poet of the 21st century Kendrick Lamar once said:

“Fuck them and fuck the industry too”.

We’re going to do the right thing even if it kills us. And it probably will. Because even if there’s a sliver of hope that we can create a fair and transparent world for artists to thrive off their creations, that’s worth everything.

I hope you can recognize your importance in all of this. You’re like the Neil Armstrong of this ‘ethical AI business model for all’. Or even better, you are the David Bowie and Bjork of it; the first artist to take the plunge, to set foot into the unknown. And we’re right there with you.

Anyways.

Rania, it has been an absolute pleasure getting to know you a bit and spending time with you. I hope we have many more existential and meta conversations and many more not so serious moments as well.

Remember to take it all in. You’re living life to the fullest right now and I hope you can find little moments for yourself. Come back to SF anytime, there’s a couch and free food in it for you. Here’s to seeing you in Tokyo very soon 😀 

Your newest friend,
Justin

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