Here at Shell Game we are infatuated with our theme song, “Me and My Shadow.” Originally written in 1927, it’s a standard that has been covered countless times over the last century, including beautifully by our own Katie Martucci for Season 1 and Blues Williams for Season 2. For our latest season on AI slop we approached another talented musician, Stefan Dismond. But this time, our senior producer Sophie Bridges came with a different brief: Could Stefan record a version of the song that sounded like it was AI-generated, without actually using AI? Could he imitate the LLMs, the way that they imitate us?
This was, admittedly, slightly unhinged and perhaps even offensive. (We doubled down though, enlisting our brilliant cover artist Devon Manney to make our slop-esque visuals as well.) But Stefan was not only game to try, he produced what may be my favorite part of the whole season: a theme that evokes 1990s-early 2000s rock era that no machine has ever had the joy of experiencing.
The song has gotten such a great reaction that I wanted to talk to Stefan about what went into it, how he feels about AI music overall, and whether he actually likes a composition that sounds like a soundtrack to a corporate webinar.
It’s really fun conversation, and a peek behind the scenes of our very human-made show.
Strolling down the avenue,
Evan
