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Comment by sdrothrock | Hacker News Reader

> Musicians could automate all the instruments with incredible accuracy since a long time. But they never do that. For some reason, they still want a person behind the piano / guitar / drums.

This actually happened on a recent hit, too -- Dua Lipa's Break My Heart. They originally had a drum machine, but then brought in Chad Smith to actually play the drums for it.

Edit: I'm not claiming this was new or unusual, just providing a recent example.

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This goes way back. Nine Inch Nails was a synth-first band with the music being written by Trent in a studio on a DAW. That worked but what really made the bad was live shows so they found ways even using 2 drummers to translate the synths and machines into human-plated instruments.

Also way before that back in the early 80’a Depeche Mode displayed the recorded drumb-reel onstage so everyone knew what it was, but when the got big enough they also transitioned into an epic live show with guitars and live drum a as well as synth-hooked drums devices they could bag on in addition to keyboards.

We are human. We want humans. Same reason I want a hipster barista to pour my coffee when a machine could do it just as well.

Same reason I want a hipster barista to pour my coffee when a machine could do it just as well.

I've wondered about this for a long time too, why on earth is anyone still able to be a barista, it turns out, people actually like the community around cafes and often that means interacting with the staff on a personal level.

Some of my best friends have been barista's I've gone to over several years.

Back before Twitter was born, or perhaps tv, cafes were just that - a place to spend evenings (…just don’t ask who watched over the kids)

It’s more than that, doing it well is still beyond sophisticated automation. Many variables that need do be constantly adjusted for. Humans are still much better at it than machines, regardless of the social element.

If true, probably not for long. Still my point is people are customer. It’s more fun to think about what won’t change. I think we will still have baristas.

A good live performance is intentionally not 100% the same as in the studio, but there can and should be variations. A refrain repeated another time, some improvisation here. Playing with the tempo there. It takes a good band, who know each other intimately, to make that work, though. (a good DJ can also do this with electronic music)

A recorded studio version, I can also listen to at home. But a full band performing in this very moment is a different experience to me.

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