About Languize

Since I was young, I suppose you could say I’ve had a contrarian streak; I never wanted to follow the crowd, and I hated being the same as everyone else. It’s a bit embarrassing, but back in elementary school, we had a debate on whether we were for or against war. I couldn’t stand the idea of siding with the other 39 students, so I was the only one to take the pro-war stance. I didn’t actually support war, but I had an instinctive desire to choose differently from others. If I were a teacher, I definitely wouldn’t want a child like me in my class.

This trait has continued to this day, and I think it’s why I ended up in this band. Fortunately, my band members are also a bit unconventional, so I feel comfortable. I’m grateful that my difficult personality hasn’t led to isolation.

Because of this personality, even after starting music, I’ve always operated with the mindset of not wanting to be the same as others. However, it wasn’t because it was an important topic; I just vaguely disliked being like everyone else. My motivation came more from wanting to create something. It was in December 2023 that “creating new music” became a top priority for me. AI had evolved to a point where it could generate decent music. I’m not saying that music itself or the culture surrounding it will be replaced by AI. From a business and cultural perspective, as long as humans don’t deliberately use AI, artists will remain human for at least another decade.

But I believe the significance of creating music will change. AI-generated music is currently still used mainly for background purposes or as a one-off joke, but it can still produce fairly good songs and melodies. Since AI generates content based on statistical methods, it’s good at creating things that appeal to the masses, essentially “good” things from a macro perspective.

In short, “I can grudgingly accept that someone might make better music than I do, but I can’t accept it if that someone is a machine.” This might not apply to everyone, but it does to me. Actually, when I said I could grudgingly accept losing to a human, I was lying. The truth is, “I can’t accept losing to a human either, but even more so to a machine.” In the realm of art, this might sound like a matter of spirit, but just as humans can never outrun a car, eventually, in music too, humans will be outdone by machines.

Let’s simplify this drastically. If AI and humans were to compete in making as many songs as possible in one hour, AI would undoubtedly win. If the challenge were to create the best melody within a set chord progression, as long as humans are the judges, AI, which can statistically create what has been deemed good, might have the upper hand.

I’m not saying, “Humans can’t beat machines, so let’s stop making music.” On the contrary, I believe the advent of AI has highlighted the essence of human creation. Remember when rock was born; its distorted guitar sounds and intense performances were deemed cool. Did such a value system exist before? Be it hip-hop, funk, or any other genre, humans have created “good” things on a different axis from what was considered good before. While AI might statistically generate better versions of existing values, it cannot create new values without thoughts, backgrounds, passion, or human errors. As long as the receiver is human, only humans can determine whether something unprecedented is good or bad, cool or not. In other words, only humans can create new values. The essence of human creation lies there, and ironically, it has been made apparent by machines.

We, BUXUS, are now working to create such “music with new values.” This goal is half due to the advent of AI and half due to my inherent obsession with being different. As long as we continue striving for new things, AI is neither a competitor nor an enemy. I believe this is the only way to create meaningfully in the coming era.

The goal of “creating music with new values” aligns with Kobo Abe’s essay “The Frontier Within,” and we decided to name our upcoming album after it. However, just as you can’t take the king in chess in one move, we couldn’t reach that frontier on our first step. Hence, we decided to go through several stages to reach that final destination, and this EP, Languize, represents the first step.

Languize is a coined term, so you won’t find it in a dictionary, but it means “to verbalize.” Why did we choose “verbalization” as the theme? There were several small themes, all of which shared the commonality of verbalization.

Firstly, simply because verbalization is essential or at least useful in band activities. For instance, we once discussed, “What does ‘taking a solo’ mean to each of us?” To me, a solo is like a speech, an image of gathering people with words. So, I prefer solos that start quietly to attract attention and end loudly, like certain dictators. However, when we discussed it, everyone had different images. For example, Dennis imagines a solo as “running around the hallways of an empty school, releasing himself.” Indeed, his solos reflect that feeling of breaking free and expressing himself freely.

Putting these thoughts into words makes our performances much better. For example, since my solo is like a speech, I want everyone to build up the excitement. Conversely, it’s rude to interfere during Dennis’s solo. No one gains anything by running alongside someone enjoying their freedom in the hallways.

Secondly, to aim for something new, we needed detailed verbal communication. I often say, “Most words used in daily life are like animal cries.” For example, even a vague “uh (pass the soy sauce)” gets the message across. I have a friend who communicates solely with “Osu,” and it usually works. Japanese people love the phrase “sumimasen.” From beginner-level “sumimasen (sorry)” and “sumimasen (thank you)” to advanced “sumimasen (could you move over?)” and “sumimasen (what’s your ticket number?)” The situation already carries meaning, so words aren’t necessary. “Osu” could be “woof,” and “sumimasen” could be “meow,” and it would still work. I consider such usage of words to be animal cries.

However, as conversations become more complex, “sumimasen” won’t suffice. Planning something or writing this essay requires words. When building something based on assumptions that only exist in words, verbal communication becomes essential. Assumptions are essentially about the future, and humans need words to share things that haven’t happened yet.

For us, aiming to create new conventions rather than following existing ones, the process of verbalization was unavoidable.

Finally, my theory is that music might be a form of language. One theory in linguistics is generative grammar, which suggests that humans don’t acquire language after birth but have an innate universal grammar that develops into speech. According to this theory, all human languages are merely dialects of this innate language. I believe music, with its roots in communication through melody, rhythm, and harmony, might be one of these dialects.

While I acknowledge that proving this theory is challenging and more of a romantic notion, I support this romantic idea because combining “music as a language” with the nuance of expressing things that haven’t been verbalized before aligns with our goal of creating something new.

As you may have noticed, this liner note itself is part of that verbalization process. I’ve written about the themes, episodes, and passion behind each song. While some argue that musicians explaining their music ruins the listener’s imagination, I believe there’s value in the experiences that come only through explanations. There are many ways to listen to music, from immersing oneself in the lyrics to analyzing the sounds or simply letting the music wash over you. I hope this serves as a new musical experience for everyone.