While some musicians like Timbaland and Paul McCartney have decided to embrace the rapidly-developing technology, others have spoken against relying on artificial intelligence.
- Jun 18, 2023
AceShowbiz - Artificial intelligence (AI) "is a machine's ability to perform the cognitive functions we usually associate with human minds, such as perceiving, reasoning, learning, interacting with an environment, problem solving, and even exercising creativity," according to McKinsey.com. Voice assistants like Siri and Alexa are some examples of features that are founded on AI technology.
While AI, like most other machines, has helped make everything faster, there has been fear that machines can someday replace humans' functions and brains. Such is the case with the use of AI in music.
With the rapidly-growing technology, AI has been used to generate versions of popular songs sung by everyone who don't originally perform the tracks. While some fans have enjoyed it for bringing something fresh, others, mostly musicians, are fed up with it.
As the trend has gone viral, with Rihanna's voice and others' being used to make fake covers of songs by Drake, Kanye West and many more, here are some musicians who have publicly declared against using AI in making music.
1. Ice Cube
AI-generated music is the last thing Ice Cube wants to hear. "I don't wanna hear an AI Drake song... Yeah, I don't wanna hear that bulls**t. He should sue whoever made it," he said of fake covers of Drake's voice singing Ice Spice's "Munch (Feelin' U)".
Asked what he would do if he found someone had done the same with his voice, the former N.W.A member swiftly replied, "I'mma sue the motherf***er who made it and the people and the platform who play it." He explained, "Somebody can't take your original voice and manipulate it without having to pay," before slamming it, "I think AI is demonic [and] I think AI is going to get a backlash from organic people."
2. Darius Rucker
While a few musicians have chosen to embrace the technology and incorporate AI into their songwriting sessions, Darius Rucker has declared against using it. "I wanna keep doing things the way I do it, and write songs the way I write songs, and let the chips fall where they may," the singer/songwriter said, admitting that he's pretty skeptical about AI in general.
"The AI thing is scary, man, it's scary," the "Don't Think I Don't Think About It" hitmaker further dissed it. "I don't wanna wake up one day and have a robot standing over me. It's scary," he added, before noting, "But technology can be that way."
3. John Rich
John Rich expressed his skepticism about AI replacing humans in songwriting when he shaded country music today. "Could AI do any worse than some of the country singers that are out there right now?" he wondered during an interview with Fox News Digital. "I'm not sure that's even possible."
"Listen, you can't replicate the great songwriters," the one-half of country music duo Big & Rich added. "Now, they might be able to take some redundant-sounding song and turn it into another redundant-sounding song, but that's the state of country music as it is today anyways."
4. Tracy Lawrence
Tracy Lawrence also thinks that things could get murky if AI continues to be used in music. "I don't really know. I played around with … a little bit of the AI stuff," he told Fox News Digital. "It's a little scary that it's kind of out there in the Wild West. I'd like to see some more regulations on it."
"I'm afraid it's going to get out of hand real quick," the country music star continued. "I hope that we put some buffers in place. Songwriters should be able to write their songs from their mind. They don't need AI helping them write songs. There's a lot of things we can use it for that probably, we really shouldn't, so we'll see how it turns out."
5. Snoop Dogg
While Tracy Lawrence is afraid that things could get worse in the future, Snoop Dogg thinks that AI music has already gotten "outta hand" these days. The rapper voiced his concern after an AI-generated song of Michael Jackson covering '90s No Limit rapper C-Murder's hit song "Down 4 My N's" went viral back in May.
Sharing a snippet of the fake cover on his Instagram page, he wrote over it, "This s**t outta hand!" He added various emojis to express his feelings of being shocked and angry.
6. Tyler Hubbard
Tyler Hubbard sees both sides of the coin. Admitting to have known how AI is used in music industry, he thinks it "could be pretty awesome" as long as it doesn't completely replace musicians.
"I don't really know a whole lot about the AI … I've heard a little bit about it. It sounds like it could be pretty awesome and also pretty crazy and scary, too," he told Fox News Digital. "As long as it doesn't learn how to write songs and perform on stage, I'll be OK. But you never know."
7. Sting
Sting warned people against AI music. "I wouldn't be complacent about artificial machine intelligence being able to write music, but the building blocks of music are human capital, so they're ours and they don't belong to a machine," he said on the night he received a fellowship from the Ivors Academy in London back in May.
Reminding everyone to have their guard up, the former The Police frontman and songwriter added, "So we have to be vigilant of what's happening, it could get very, very strange so we need to be ready."
8. Drake
Drake is another musician who is not a fan of AI music. Having had his voice be used to create fake covers of Cardi B's "WAP" and Bryson Tiller's "Don't" among other songs, he had enough after an AI-generated cover of him rapping Ice Spice's "Munch (Feelin' U)" went viral in April.
"This is the final straw AI," the Canadian superstar wrote on his Instagram Story, along with a headline that mentioned how his record label has taken a serious action to protect its artists. Apparently after Drizzy's complaint, Universal Music Group has asked Spotify, Apple Music and other streaming platforms to take down all AI versions of its artists. "We will not hesitate to take steps to protect our rights and those of our artists," the company warned.
