The irony being that the 90’s hip hop sound was largely influenced by MPC60/3000 quantization, amongst other drum machines.

Except for J Dilla. https://www.npr.org/sections/ablogsupreme/2013/02/07/1713490...

They generated the lyrics and melodies using AI. Everything else was done by a person, including the vocals.

Do you have a link on that? I can’t find it in the HN link.

The Adweek source linked goes into a little more about it, but not much. Specifically mentioning a model was used for lyrics first, then the AI created a melodic and percussive arrangement. It doesn't say much more about how it was done.

I found another article that states they had a real human voice sing the lyrics (then auto-tuned it to Scott's style), but there's no actual sources here, or on any other articles I can find.

https://musebycl.io/digital-data/agency-used-ai-make-travis-...

I did follow through to Adweek, but given that it is Adweek and not NME, I wasn’t sure how literally to take the word “arrangement” there :-) Thanks!

See the adweek article that was linked in OP's article, it has more details. The AI part was only lyrics, melodies, and percussion arrangements; not actually the production itself.

I didn't get that from the article.

See the adweek article that was linked in OP's article, it has more details. The AI part was only lyrics, melodies, and percussion arrangements; not actually the production itself.

I'm not clear what you mean. How does auto-tune make it easier for the computer to generate?

Computer generated voice has certain artifacts that makes it a bit distinctive. Auto-tuned natural voice has similar artifacts, so if an artist uses auto-tune, then there's less noticeable difference between their real (computer-altered) voice and a fake computer-generated voice.

A more exaggerated example would be artists that use a vocoder (e.g. Daft Punk or something like that), which would be even easier to synthesise convincingly because the real vocals are also mostly synthesised.

Or VibeSquaD.

(not UK Vibe Squad)

Less "uncanny valley" affect, because in both cases, you're hearing a synthesized voice.

I can't parse this comment. What is "R&Bish"? Why does that matter that it's easy? What makes 90's hip-hop "real" or implicitly superior to the last two decades?

R&B: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhythm_and_blues

ish: https://www.dictionary.com/browse/ish

So, having an aesthetic similar to rhythm and blues.