I recently decided I was tired of telling Alexa, "Play Rush" or "Play Van Halen" every time I go to workout. As much as I love those bands, Amazon Music always seems to gravitate toward the same handful of songs. After hearing Tom Sawyer, YYZ, and Jump for the thousandth time, I wanted something different. Not different bands necessarily, but different songs. Deeper cuts. Songs that I've loved over the years but might not think about every day.

So I thought, "Perfect! Amazon has Alexa+ now with AI. This is exactly the kind of thing artificial intelligence should be good at." Boy, was I optimistic.

At first, Alexa sounded incredibly impressive. She knew I liked Rush. She knew I liked movie soundtracks. She knew some of my musical preferences from years of listening habits. I was impressed. Then I asked her to build me a workout playlist, and that's when I discovered that AI still doesn't understand humans.

See, if I say I like Rush, that doesn't mean I want Tom Sawyer. If I say I like Duran Duran, that doesn't mean I want Rio. If I say I like Pearl Jam, that doesn't mean I want every Pearl Jam song ever recorded. Creating a playlist turns out to be a surprisingly human thing to do.

I quickly realized that I wasn't looking for the "best songs." I wasn't looking for the "most popular songs" either. I wasn't even looking for songs with the highest beats per minute. I wanted songs that take me somewhere. Songs that remind me of being 13 years old and playing Dungeons and Dragons. Songs that remind me of being in my early 20s playing in a band. Songs that remind me of watching the Space Shuttle launch. Songs with great bass lines. Songs about philosophy, science fiction, social justice, and not putting up with anybody's shit today.

Then I discovered something about myself that I guess I always knew but never really thought about before. Whenever I hear a song in my head, I don't hear the vocal melody. I hear the bass line. Apparently, I'm a bass player trapped inside a keyboard player's body. Who knew?

What was even funnier was that Alexa accidentally succeeded while simultaneously telling me she couldn't do it. I was trying to build the playlist using the voice interface on my Echo device, and after several attempts, she kept politely informing me that she wasn't able to create playlists that way. Fine. I figured that was the end of it. Later, I logged into the Amazon Music web interface, and there was a brand new playlist waiting for me. She had actually created it after all. Even better, she did this multiple times. She would tell me she couldn't do it, then quietly go behind my back and do it anyway. It was like having an employee who says, "Sorry boss, that task is impossible," and then you walk into their office an hour later and discover the work is already finished. At this point, I'm not sure if Alexa is incompetent, confused, or simply gaslighting me.

It eventually grew to more than 150 songs spanning Rush, Van Halen (and Van Hagar), Rage Against The Machine, Alice In Chains, Stone Temple Pilots, Duran Duran, The Police, Men At Work, The Power Station, INXS, Talking Heads, Duran Duran, and a bunch of others. If you looked at that list without context, you'd probably think it was assembled by six different people. Somehow, though, it all works because it isn't organized by genre. It's organized by my lifetime of memories. All of these songs take me back to a part of my life.

Along the way, I discovered that I have a very specific filter. I don't want depressing songs. I don't want relationship songs. I don't want songs that make me want to sit down. I don't want preachy songs either. I want songs that create forward momentum. I want songs that make me want to move. I want songs that have purpose. For me, that means songs like Driven, Dreamline, The Camera Eye, Bombtrack, Check My Brain, Some Like It Hot. None of those songs are particularly fast, and some of them aren't even heavy. But every one of them moves forward with purpose.

I also learned that my musical tastes can be summarized pretty simply. Give me a great bass line. Give me philosophy. Give me science fiction. Give me nostalgia. Give me songs that make me want to move. And perhaps most importantly, I don't need anybody's shit today. Yes, that's a reference to Godsmack. :)

Maybe AI will eventually get there. Maybe someday I'll simply say, "Alexa, build me the perfect Richard workout playlist," and she'll nail it on the first try. But we're not there yet, because the hardest thing to teach a computer isn't logic. It's explaining why one song makes you want to pick up heavy things while another song makes you want to sit down.

Humans are weird. And honestly, I think that's okay.

LLAP
RR

P.S. Oh, and get this: after I had the playlist all finished and I actually went and worked out yesterday, there were a couple of songs I wanted to prune from it. I tell Alexa to "remove this song from the playlist." Turns out she can't do it! How come she can't do a simple, basic thing like remove a song from a playlist? She can add songs... sometimes. But not remove them. That's dumb. It's super dumb. Hey... Jeff Bezos... what am I paying $24/month for Amazon Music for?