Today I spoke at La Digital Tech Conference in Rennes, France on The Future of Connected Music. In included two videos of the one of my favourite robot bands, called Z-Machines. As the audience seemed to like this so much, I decided to post the videos here for you to enjoy as well. You can hear the band play in this beautiful piece composed by Squarepusher.
Z-MACHINES is composed as follows:
MACH – Robot guitarist challenging the speed of over BPM1000. 78-finger Guitar.
ASHURA – Robot drummer that can play the most complex rhythm on 22 drums.
COSMO – Robot keyboard player resembling a future life form
Beyond-Human!
Referred to as “an attempt to break new ground for emotional machine music” by its composer Squarepusher, “Sad Robot Goes Funny” features the superhuman prowess of Z-MACHINES, showcasing in particular the stupendous chops of the guitarist playing multiple melody lines with 78 fingers and 12 picks at lightning speed in the latter half of the song.
This makes it a truly groundbreaking piece of music from Squarepusher to open the way for new music of the future.
Movie director : Daito Manabe of Rhizomatiks
‘Music For Robots‘ EP has been released in 2014 via Warp Records.
A live concert of Z-Machines can be seen here in The Battle of the Robot Music Bands: Z Machines vs Compressorhead. Go straight to minute 5 to see the band performing in Tokyo on a beverage maker ZIMA launch party, turning the band into a “Social Party Robot Band”. You can hire the band and create your own set for them to play and integrate even sponsor messages. They totally rock it!
Related posts on The Futures Agency blog
Artificial Emotional Intelligence
Deep Shift: Technology Tipping Points and Societal Impact (WEF Report)
The Consequences of Machine Intelligence
These Technologies Will Shift the Global Balance of Power in the Next 20 Years
And check out ‘Redefining the relationship of man and machine’ – an audio-visual meditation by Gerd Leonhard.
In this unique film, Futurist Gerd Leonhard reads his chapter in the 2015 book ‘The Future of Business’, entitled ‘Redefining the relationship of man and machine’. In his piece, Gerd addresses the key issues and opportunities that will arise from an increasing convergence of humanity and technology, touching on related topics such as AI, Digital Ethics, reductionism, technological unemployment and machine-thinking.
Posted by Rudy de Waele aka @mtrends / shift2020.com