Exclude styles generator

How to write an exclude list that works

• Name a sound, not a feeling. "no distorted guitar" is actionable. "not bad" is not.
• Keep it short. Five to eight exclusions is plenty. A long negative list competes with your positive direction for attention and often wins in unhelpful ways.
• Exclude the thing that actually went wrong. Generate first, listen, then subtract what you heard — guessing in advance usually removes something you would have liked.
• Prefer a positive instruction when one exists. "solo female lead" beats "no male vocals, no choir, no duet" — it says the same thing in fewer words and leaves less room for interpretation.
• Stay consistent in wording. Mixing "no autotune" with "exclude: heavy reverb" in one line makes the list harder to read and harder to edit later. The prefix toggle exists so you don't have to retype anything.

Where the list goes

Most setups take exclusions in the same Style field, appended after your positive direction, or in a dedicated exclude field when one is offered. Use "One per line" when you're keeping a list in your notes, and the single-line form when pasting into a field.

The four groups

Vocals covers who is singing and how — the most common source of unwanted surprises. Instruments handles the one timbre that keeps showing up uninvited. Mood & energy is for results that land emotionally wrong despite the right instrumentation. Production is where mix complaints belong: too much reverb, too much compression, a low end that swallows everything.

Iterating

Add one exclusion at a time and regenerate. If the result improves, keep it; if nothing changes, the phrase probably wasn't the cause and should come back out. A list that grows without ever shrinking is usually a list nobody is testing.