HOW SONGS WERE CREATED
I’ve been asked a lot how I actually made all of these DJ Rojo songs, so I will try and sum it up here. It’s a combination of my own lyrics, using an AI song creation app (SUNO – where I provide extensive prompts and instructions), and a TON of patience and work re-doing, re-editing, and restructuring songs.
Despite the TON of work I did with these songs, making sure they sounded the way I wanted them to, I am aware that ultimately AI is doing most of the heavy lifting here. And when I say “lifting,” I am fully aware that certain elements might be ripped off from existing music. While my original lyrics and extensive instructions have made these songs “unique,” it’s always possible some chords or beats have been taken from elsewhere. (I definitely feel occasional vibes of Duran Duran, Pet Shop Boys, Depeche Mode, OMD, etc, in several places).
A lot of known music producers have been using SUNO to remix their own music, but I’m still not fond of the idea of going anywhere with my own stuff. This is why I have ZERO intention of “publishing” these songs or attempting to make a profit. All I want is for the music to be freely shared and enjoyed.
LYRICS
The lyrics are all 100% mine. I was actually worried that since I’m using an AI app to create the music, that some people might think I was also using AI for the lyrics too. Since that’s the one part of this that I can fully control and that I know I can do all by myself quite well, why on Earth would I use AI for that?? 🙈 It was the part I was most excited about, and I tried my best to write lyrics that were funny, touching or irreverent. So I purposely wrote most of the songs from a very personal point of view that was unique to me, talking about my health issues or personal experiences — mainly to hammer the fact that the lyrics were all mine.
Did I know anything about songwriting before this? Not really. Of course I knew about verse/chorus/bridge structures, so I naturally wrote with that in mind. Also, rhymezone.com was a very big help at times. Actually, in the beginning, I didn’t realize that you could give the SUNO app instructions and actually specify which parts of the song were verse vs. chorus, etc. And so my initial songs were written in such a way where it was very obvious what was what — hoping that the app would “pick up” my intentions and generate the songs as they were meant to be. Once I realized you could add specific instructions, it allowed me to be much more creative and original in my song structures.
STYLES & STRUCTURE
When you click on the “Custom” section within the SUNO app, there are two important main sections: Lyrics and Styles. Styles is where you enter the musical genres that you want the song to ultimately adopt, and I quickly learned that the more of a “mix” of styles you give, the more interesting the ultimate output will be. For my songs, I wanted some consistency, so my style mix of choice was “Industrial,” “New Wave,” “synth-pop,” and “Techno.” (And there’s a very handy “Reuse Styles” option on each song that makes this easier). Ocassionally I would throw in some additional fun and different styles like “funk” or “goth” or “house” to give some songs a different edge.
Here is an example of one song, “Vacation from Hell”, with the lyrics and the prompts that I used. Within the lyrics, you’ll see stuff written in brackets [like this] — the app will ignore and not sing whatever’s within the brackets. These are song structure tags where you can give specific instructions such as [bass drop] or [percussion interlude]. You can find a bunch of really helpful prompts and tags on the howtopromptsuno website. You can be as instructive and specific as you want, but the AI doesn’t always do exactly what you have in mind…. at first (sometimes a TON of credits are wasted, which is why getting a Pro subscription is really worth it).
You can also upload your own music samples (if you can play instruments, which I can’t), and even sing/hum a tune for the AI to adopt (which I have done, and it usually works!).
While I talk about “Vacation From Hell,” feel free to listen and follow along with the lyrics and notes:
VACATION FROM HELL
VACATION FROM HELL (lyrics in blue)
[verse, energetic, rap-like]
But once we hit takeoff it comes apart at the seams.
Delays, turbulence, lost luggage – nothing goes right.
Now we’re trying to find our hotel in the middle of the night.
NOTES (in italics)
I had a particular way I wanted the verse to be delivered, and “rap-like” was all I could think of. Luckily, the initial style prompts take center stage, which doesn’t make this song anything like a rap song per-se. But I knew adding this structure tag within the lyrics would affect the delivery without making the song actually sound like rap.
[chorus]
[staccato, multiple singers in harmony, chant]
This
might
be
a…
[normal singer]
Vacation From Hell
Vacation From Hell
[staccato, harmony]
Our room
has
grass
on the [stretch out] floor
[insertion]
(What the fuck?)
[staccato, multiple singers in harmony, chant]
We’re
trapped
in
a…
[normal singer]
Vacation From Hell
We try and ring the bell
[staccato, harmony]
But all
the
staff
have gone [stretch out] home
For the chorus, I had a specific way I wanted the first and last parts to be drawn out, one word at a time, and with harmonies.
I know that most of the time, when writing each word on a separate line, it will force the app to actually sing it that way (sometimes). But just to be safe, I also added the [staccato / chant] tags.
I also wanted the last word of each section of the chorus to be drawn out. Not sure if my [stretch out] tag did the trick, or the app just naturally outputed it that way. But if I wrote “flooooor” or “hooooome”, the app would surely sing it incorrectly.
I added the [insertion] of “(What the fuck)” to show that I wanted it added WITHOUT it affecting the rhythm of the chorus. Without that tag, it could have thrown the whole song off completely.
[verse, energetic]
Next day we take some tours — let’s hope nothing goes wrong.
But you know that’s not the case due to the name of this song.
Rip-offs, scams, tourist traps — all of it sucks.
We’ve barely done a thing all day yet spent six hundred bucks.
[chorus]
[staccato, harmonies, chant]
This
might
be
a…
[normal]
Vacation From Hell
Vacation From Hell
[staccato, harmony]
I’m afraid
it
needs
to be [stretch out] said.
[staccato]
We’re
trapped
in
a…
[harmonies]
Vacation From Hell
What’s that smell?
[staccato]
Coming out
from
under the [stretch out] bed.
As you can see, the further down in the lyrics I get, I start to write less tags and instructions. Basically, as long as you continue to structure the lyrics in a similar way, and want the song to be sung in the same way, the app will automatically keep things the same for you – unless you instruct it otherwise.
[interlude, quiet]
Wait a minute…
[beautiful and gentle]
Finally there’s something nice.
Who knew we’d get such joy…
From a fried ball of rice?
Such a simple thing…
Is all we really need.
But then another day’s ruined…
[crescendo to a dramatic chorus]
From the street vendor greed.
I have been including an [interlude] or [bridge] in most of my songs, just to vary things up a bit.
I wanted this part to be [beautiful and gentle], to show the Vacation From Hell finally has some relief from all the crappy things that have been happening.
But then, “another day’s ruined…”, and so I wanted a build up to a [crescendo to a dramatic chorus]…
This
a…
Vacation From Hell
Vacation From Hell
Oh my god it’s starting to rain
We’re
Vacation From Hell
This just ain’t going well
I think it’s finally
At this stage I’ve dropped most of the tags all together. The app “gets” what I want now. I just wanted this last chorus to be the most energetic, so that’s the only tag I added.
[outro, normal singer]
There’s no public transportation
(Vacation From Hell)
This is such a big frustration.
(Vacation From Hell)
I see the manager — “Hey, fuck you!”
(Vacation From Hell)
Can’t wait to leave my bad review
(Vacation From Hell)
(Vacation From Hell)
(Vacation From Hell)
Sometimes I’ll be more specific with structure tags for how I want an [outro] to be, and sometimes I’ll just see what the app comes up with. The endings are the easiest to change (I’ll talk more about this in the EDITING section below). So the app actually gave me the perfect ending, so there was no need to change anything.
The only thing I definitely wanted was some evil laughter at the end. So I had to add specific tags to make the music stop, and then add that I wanted the laughter to sound satanic. (Otherwise it could make it “joyous” laughter, which would be completely wrong).
An [END] tag is important, because sometimes if you don’t put that the app will just keep adding a long section of instrumental music. Some songs had that intentionally, but I really wanted the song here to end after the laughter, and not pick up with music again…
OUTPUT
I could have given a TON more of very specific instructions in the stucture tags within the lyrics (and with some songs, I certainly did), but sometimes I want to give a little freedom to hear what the app decideds to generate.
So after I write the lyrics, and give the app all the styles and struture tags (and sing/hum tunes I have in mind), it’s finally time to output some songs. The app uses a credit system, and the free version allows a couple of attempts per day. Also, any songs you generate using the free version are technically owned by the app maker. If you pay for a susbcription, you get a LOT more credits (trust me, you need them), and then you own the songs. My first attempts were using the free version, but I immediately saw I would need to subscribe.
Each time you output songs, it gives you two different versions. If you’ve written the lyrics in a certain way, and gave the app a ton of structure tags, styles, etc, then the output will generate very similar-sounding songs. The looser instructions you give, or the less structure with the lyrics, the more the app will just do its thing and give you whatever it wants. I like giving just enough structure to get mostly what I want, but allowing myself to be a little surprised by the app too.
In the beginning, I would sometimes go through at least a dozen attempts for a single song before I found something I kind of liked (and even then, it might mean I only liked the beginning of one, and would need to continue to work on it — more on that below). However, I got MUCH better at knowing exactly what I wanted, and how to make the app generate close to what I imagined — and I would often get a song I loved within the first attempt or two. (And still, sometimes I would waste a ton of credits to see if “something even better” came along, but often it would not. So I learned quickly, as soon as you have something you love, don’t bother wasting more credits).
Once you have the START of a song you like, you may need to change things about it. Maybe the basic structure and rythym of the song is good, but the styles aren’t quite right. Or maybe the singer’s voice it gave you is not what you imagined. If that happens, you can use the “Cover” feature to change styles or singing voices. (This is not ALWAYS possible, and sometimes you really need to make lots of different attempts with different commands). You can also use the “Cover” feature (keeping the same styles), to simply change some lyrics. (This also doesn’t always work, and it’s better if the changed lyric is a single word here and there, and not entire sentences or clumps of words — especially if the change breaks the pattern of singing in any way).
EDITING
Maybe after outputting some songs, you’ll find one that you like, and there will be very little need to change it. Out of several dozens of songs that I’ve made now, there’s only been 2 or 3 times where a song felt “perfect” from the get-go. Or sometimes it’s 95% there, and just using the “Remaster” function of the app brings it to 100%.
Usually, there needs to be some (or a lot) of editing. As I mentioned above, minor changes (with styles or small lyric changes) can be done with the “Cover” feature. However, often there might be a song that starts off really amazingly, but at some point the song goes south. Often this is due to a mistake in the lyrics. I try my best to have each line have the same kind of rhythm (singing them out loud to myself to make sure), but sometimes the app has something different in mind. When this happens, the “Extend” feature is necessary.
Here’s the thing about “Extend.” It’s meant to make a song longer, and add more to it. However, you can actually point to ANY point in the song and change it from that point on. (Don’t worry, the original never goes away until you decide to delete it yourself).
There’s a HUGE problem with this, though. If you’ve gotten at least the first verse AND chorus of the song, and are changing something after that, then it’s not so bad — as the app will continue to keep that structure, somewhat. However… it really DOES change everything from whatever point of the song you chose going forward. And even when you have half the song already, it will keep offering different alternatives for the second half. Most will sound roughly the same-ish, but the app will keep changing things.
So if you’re trying to change something in the middle of a song, yet you REALLY love what the app did with the end of a song, please keep in mind that using the “Extend” feature might change the ending completely, and you might not ever be able to recreate it exactly how it was.
If you only want to change a small thing (like a word or two), then the “Replace section” feature is what you need. BUT — this feature is ONLY available on the website version of SUNO (something I didn’t figure out until I was doing my third album already. Had I known, I would have saved a TON of credits — as the “Replace Section” feature can fix a small mistake really fast!).
FINAL THOUGHTS
I found this video of a kid who obviously knows a LOT more about music than me, but it captures some of the excitement I’ve had creating these songs. As you can see from that video, there’s a LOT of fine-tuning you can do with the SUNO software.
I was able to do 95% of what I wanted within the SUNO app itself, but once in a while I would need to do further editing in something like Garageband. (There are tons of tutorials for that software out there, so I won’t go into details here).
Please keep in mind that I used the subscription model of the SUNO app, which gave me a LOT of credits, to make several hundred songs if I wanted to.
But because every time I output multiple versions of each song, and then use “Remaster,” “Cover,” “Extend,” or “Replace Section,” it costs me tons of credits each time. I waste what would be normally be credits for 2-3 dozen songs on just a single song sometimes. It’s a big waste, but I really want to make sure I get songs that I actually love and want to listen to repeatedly.
Ultimately, using this app requires a TON of patience, and trial and error. I’m really hoping there will be updates to the app in the future that will allow for even more precise editing and changes. Most of my songs are flawless, but a few have some minor errors. Maybe I’m the only one that notices them, but my attempts to fix them just make the songs worse, so I’m living with the mistakes.