Lupe Fiasco And Google Build AI Tool To Help Artists Write More Creative Lyrics

GRAMMY Award-winning rapper Lupe Fiasco has collaborated with Google Lab Sessions to develop an experimental AI tool, TextFX.

TextFX is an AI-powered tool for rappers, writers, and wordsmiths to enhance their use of lyrical and linguistic techniques.

TextFX

A play on the acronym for sound effects (SFX), TextFXis an experimental demonstrating how generative language technologies can empower the creativity and workflows of artists and creators.

It was created in collaboration with Lupe Fiasco who drew inspiration from the lyrical and linguistic techniques he developed throughout his career. 

He frequently tinkers with language, crafting phrases that carry diverse meaning, and plays with literary devices like similes, alliteration, and acronyms.

Lupe and the team eventually came up with 10 prompts that allowed the AI model to replicate these linguistic techniques. The prompts also primed the AI to break words into similar sounding phrases, evaluate a topic through different points of view, make a scene more imaginative and unexpected, and more. 

The TextFX app was then built to house the prompts, giving artists a new way to play with text and language in creative ways.

“Rap is born out of technology” 

Fiasco is collaborating with the technology for his new “Glass of Water” track after admitting he was shocked at how impactful TextFX was with only a tiny amount of information when making the song.

In a video released promoting TextFX, Fiasco defended the use of A.I. in Hip-Hop as he claims the genre “wouldn’t exist” without technological advancements.

He continued to say that AI, particularly LLMs, are the next frontier in the evolution of artistry.

“Rap is born out of technology,” Fiasco said in the Google video.

He did, however, state that although TextFX can be a resource during the song-making process, it won’t actually do all the work.

“It’s just providing you with different opportunities and workflow, and being efficient, and you know, offloading certain things so your mind can focus on other things,” said Fiasco.