The Jujitsu Mindset: A Musician's Guide to AI Cognitive Dissonance

I went to a concert last night. The performance was fantastic, driven by the raw, human energy of the band. But what elevated the show from a great set to an immersive experience was the visuals. A massive screen behind the stage displayed a constantly evolving series of stunning, abstract art pieces, perfectly synced to the music. They were beautiful, complex, and emotionally resonant. They were also, very clearly, generated with AI.

And that’s where the problem started for me. I know for a fact that this same artist has been publicly critical of AI in the music space, posting videos with an "anti-AI" stance for musicians. How can one form of AI art be a celebrated, integral part of the show while another is vilified as a threat to the entire craft?

This is a case of cognitive dissonance, and it’s rampant in the creative world today.

The "Someone Else's Lunch" Problem

At its core, this contradiction is driven by a simple, emotional bias: we tend to see technology as a wonderful tool when it helps us, but as a threat when it encroaches on our specific domain. It’s the "someone else's lunch" problem. An artist is happy to use AI to generate stunning visuals, a task they might have previously outsourced or ignored. The AI is eating the graphic designer's lunch, not theirs, so they’re happy to pull up a chair to the feast.

But when that same technology is applied to their own discipline—music—the walls go up. This isn’t a logical position; it’s an emotional one, driven by fear of being replaced rather than a consistent philosophy about technology and art.

The Tool, Not the Threat

The truth is, AI isn’t good or bad; it’s a tool. This isn’t the first time a transformative technology has been met with fear and skepticism in the music world. The synthesizer was decried as a sterile, soulless replacement for real orchestras. The sampler was written off as "cheating" and a threat to musicianship. Today, both are indispensable tools used across every genre of music.

The debate should not be whether AI is used, but how it is used. The focus should be on the intent, effort, and quality of the final product, all of which are guided by the human at the helm.

The Jujitsu Mindset

So, what’s the path forward for the modern creator? I believe it is to adopt a "jujitsu mindset." In the martial art of jujitsu, a practitioner does not meet an opposing force with rigid resistance. They blend with it, redirect its energy, and use its momentum to their own advantage.

Instead of building a wall to resist the force of AI, you can learn to use its momentum to create things you couldn’t before. You can leverage it to break creative blocks, generate a "better mess" of ideas, and become more efficient, powerful, and innovative in bringing your unique vision to life.

JGBL's Take: The Future is Fluid

The artists who will thrive in the next decade are the ones with the jujitsu mindset. They will not see themselves as just "musicians" or "visual artists," trapped in rigid disciplines. They will be fluid and adaptable. They will embrace the entire modern toolkit—visual AI, musical AI, marketing AI—to augment their creativity.

The future won’t belong to the artists who resist the new tools. It will belong to the Augmented Creatives who master them.