Music AI isn't just for generating tracks—one producer turned Suno into a $10/month communication tool that saves $300 per song. Here's the counterintuitive workflow that's actually worth stealing. The Setup After eight years of making music, Alexander Kumar knows exactly how a track should sound. The verse should hit a certain way. The breath should fall in a specific spot. The flow needs to pull back right before the hook lands. But explaining that with words? Tricky. Humming doesn't help when you're not a singer. And hiring vocalists just to test ideas before committing runs $100+ per hour. So he did something mildly controversial in music circles: he started using Suno. But not to generate music. To generate clarity. Suno As a Communication Tool Suno is an AI tool that generates music from text prompts. Type a style prompt → get a finished track. But that's not what Suno does for Alexander. It's not making his music. It's not writing his lyrics. And it's not replacing his vocalists.
I use it as a rapid prototyping tool—for music.
It gives him vocal performance references he can use to:
Communicate ideas to artists Test different vocal deliveries before recording Create sample packs from atmospheric vocal elements Figure out what actually works before committing
That alone saves $200-300 per track in wasted studio time. What This Replaces (And What It Doesn't) What it replaces:
- Humming
- Hours of explaining flow to vocalists
- Paying for vocal demos ($100-200 per track)
- Trial-and-error in expensive studio time
- Guessing if a lyric flow works What it doesn't replace:
- Actual recording quality
- Human vocal performance nuance
- Your production skills
- Your creative vision
- Your final mix What it enhances:
- Decision-making speed
- Communication with artists
- Pre-production planning
- Sample library creation
- Workflow efficiency If you think Suno is going to make your tracks for you, you're missing the point. It's a power tool. Not a replacement for skill.
Want to read the rest? The full post includes Alexander's 5-element prompt framework, his exact prompts, complete workflows, and honest failure analysis → Read on Substack