Engram is a sampler that turns broken AI hallucinations into music
Engram is a sampler that turns broken AI hallucinations into music
Engram：一款将破碎的 AI 幻觉转化为音乐的采样器
Music startup Thoughtful Things has just launched the Kickstarter campaign for its first instrument, Engram. It’s a sampler and groovebox that uses AI to mangle incoming audio and even hallucinate completely new sounds. This isn’t Suno in a box, though. This isn’t a “push-button, get-song” device, aimed at creating something that sounds ready for top-40 radio. It’s about creating experimental, uncanny sounds and pushing AI audio models beyond their limits.
音乐初创公司 Thoughtful Things 刚刚为其首款乐器 Engram 发起了 Kickstarter 众筹活动。这是一款采样器兼律动工作站（groovebox），它利用人工智能来处理输入的音频，甚至能“幻觉”出全新的声音。不过，它并不是一个“盒装版 Suno”。它不是那种旨在生成适合电台播放的“一键成曲”设备，而是专注于创造实验性、离奇的声音，并将 AI 音频模型推向极限。
Engram isn’t connected to the internet. Instead, it runs a “tiny AI” locally. According to the Kickstarter listing, the model is designed in-house and custom-trained. The company says: “We’ve trained our audio models on open datasets that only contain audio licensed for commercial use (CC-BY or similar). We have not trained and will never train our models on non-commercial, pirated, or otherwise stolen data.”
Engram 不连接互联网，而是在本地运行一个“微型 AI”。根据 Kickstarter 的页面显示，该模型由公司内部设计并经过定制训练。该公司表示：“我们使用仅包含商业许可音频（CC-BY 或类似协议）的开放数据集来训练我们的音频模型。我们从未、也绝不会使用非商业、盗版或其他被窃取的数据来训练我们的模型。”
The company also plans to open up Engram’s firmware so that others can tweak it or load their own custom models. In the campaign video, founder Evan King uses his voice to ask for “piano,” and Engram spits out something glitchy and vaguely piano-like. He says to think of Engram as a “field recorder for latent space.” It’s about exploring the world of AI hallucinations and experimental sound design. It even draws inspiration from circuit bending, allowing you to tweak and even break its tiny AI models.
该公司还计划开放 Engram 的固件，以便其他人可以对其进行调整或加载自定义模型。在众筹视频中，创始人 Evan King 用语音要求“钢琴”，Engram 便输出了一种带有故障感且隐约像钢琴的声音。他说，可以将 Engram 视为“潜空间的现场录音机”。它的核心在于探索 AI 幻觉和实验性声音设计的世界。它甚至从电路弯曲（circuit bending）中汲取了灵感，允许用户调整甚至“破坏”其微型 AI 模型。
Thoughtful Things is launching with a limited run of Engrams for the Kickstarter campaign, starting at $675. The company hasn’t said what the retail price will be, though it’s likely to be between $850 and $900, as the $675 pledge is listed as a 30 percent discount.
Thoughtful Things 此次为 Kickstarter 众筹活动推出了限量版 Engram，起售价为 675 美元。该公司尚未公布正式零售价，但考虑到 675 美元的众筹价格被标注为 30% 的折扣，预计零售价可能在 850 美元至 900 美元之间。