#23 That’s How You AI a Song

We gave a computer more than 300 Eurovision Song Contest entries from the last decade and this is what it gave us. Songwriting might not be so hard after all. The EuroWhat is back after a surprise hiatus with a jam-packed episode. First, Ben and Mike catch up on a month of random Eurovision sightings. Starbucks? NBC’s daytime and nighttime schedule? Johnny Weir’s Instagram? Yes, yes, and yaaaaaaaaaas. Have you encountered any Eurovision in the Wild? Let us know! Have a better name than “Eurovision in the Wild”? DEFINITELY let us know. Then we switch gears to talk about the concept of songwriting. Britcoms have previously tackled this topic, specifically Father Ted‘s series two episode “A Song for Europe.” Surely we could write a song better than “My Lovely Horse,” right? I mean, we have just as much musical and songwriting talent as Dougal and Ted… Nah, let’s just have a computer take care of it. In our two-step process (songwriting may not have more than two steps, after all), we compiled the lyrics of more than 300 Eurovision entries and gave them to a bot to develop a predictive keyboard. We were hoping that the bot would spit out next year’s winning entry, but the technology isn’t quite there yet. But if you are looking for a song title generator, we’ve got you covered. Plug in your headphones and enjoy this week’s episode of AI’s Got Talent? Episode Summary * Eurovision in the Wild (4:19) * Father Ted “A Song for Europe” (13:44) * An Intro to AI and Markov Chains (19:29) * Step 1: Compile It (The List is Really Long) (22:04) * Step 2: We Used Botnik (That’s How We Wrote a Song) (25:34) * Eurovision Song Titles (29:23) * Next Week’s Episode (33:16) Songwriting Resources * Eurovision Song Title Keyboard: https://tinyurl.com/EurowhatTitleGenerator * Eurovision Song Lyrics Keyboard: https://tinyurl.com/EurowhatLyricsGenerator * How to Write a Song for the Eurovision Song Contest (ESC Insight) Links * Netta on the Today Show (NBC) * Johnny Weir en “Fuego” (WiWiBlogs) * Farmer’s Insurance: “Hall of Claims: Abstract Accident” (iSpot) * Glennis Grace America’s Got Talent Audition and Judges’ Cuts performance (NBC) * Father Ted song My Lovely Horse turned down by committee (BBC) Subscribe The EuroWhat? Podcast is available on Apple Podcasts, Google Play, or your podcast catcher of choice. When you subscribe,