This week
The trend:
Because the future keeps happening, despite multiple petitions for it to stop.
If you’ve been wondering what fresh cultural farce we’ve wandered into, congratulations: we’ve reached the part of the timeline where AI bands are racking up royalties no one can trace, streaming farms are laundering vibes instead of money and actual musicians - you know, the ones with lungs and opinions - are left asking whether their label might one day be replaced by a particularly entrepreneurial toaster.
Meanwhile, the Jorja Smiths of the world are out here trying to make music, while synthetic crooners reverse-engineer her entire catalogue in the time it takes to microwave leftover pasta. It’s all very ‘late-stage capitalism meets GCSE ICT project’, with a dash of ‘should someone call a lawyer or an exorcist?’
Anyway. Strap in. The circus has automated the clowns.
AI Music Is No Longer ‘Coming’. It Is Here, Loud and Auto Tuned
The last year has been full of ‘oh that is cool’ demos, but suddenly we are in ‘wait, did an algorithm just drop a better hook than my favourite artist?’ territory. AI models can now:
Clone your voice from a short reference
Generate beats in any genre (Drake × Christmas lofi × trap bells is real and terrifying)
Write lyrics that sound believable enough to fool your uncle
Drop full songs on Spotify before lunch
The music industry is sweating like it clicked a phishing link.
The Real World Wake Up Call: Jorja Smith’s Label Has Entered the Chat
The controversy around the track I Run by UK dance act Haven turned into a full legal dispute.
The chain of events:
The track went viral on TikTok with vocals that sounded very similar to Jorja Smith.
Accusations emerged that the producers used AI tools to clone her voice, allegedly trained on her catalogue.
Her label FAMM demanded a share of royalties and stated that this issue is bigger than one song or one artist.
Streaming platforms removed the track. A version with new vocals was uploaded, although FAMM argued that clarity around AI generated music is urgently needed.
This case is an early landmark. It is no longer sci-fi. It is happening in real time.
The Money Part: Things Are About to Get Wild
Here is where it gets interesting. AI music is not just art. It is economics.
Within the next year or two we may see:
Artists licensing their voice as intellectual property
Fans generating custom songs with their favourite artists involved
A boom in AI producer tools worth billions
Royalties becoming chaotic when most uploads are AI generated
More cases like I Run where AI created vocals lead to takedowns or legal claims
#BuyNowCryLater #HoHoBroke
What Happens to Human Artists Now
The bad news: AI can create music faster, cheaper and surprisingly well.
But what they can’t replace is the mess and joy of actual human experience: CONCERTS.
It cannot:
Queue for overpriced lager at a gig, lose a shoe in a mosh pit or hear a live encore that changes your tax bracket and your outlook on life.
Go to a concert and cry at the chorus.
Experience a bass drop as a spiritual event.
File a tax return with the sense of foreboding only a living soul knows.
Can’t sweat in a crowd, scream lyrics off-key or have a full breakdown during a bridge because the chord progression ‘felt personal.’
In reality, authenticity will matter more than ever. Imperfection becomes the product. Humanity becomes the selling point.
It also might be helpful to see AI not as a replacement, but as:
A co writer
A studio intern who never sleeps
A band member who knows every genre ever invented
Giphy
Three Future Scenarios You Will Want to Screenshot and Share
Outrage
‘AI just released a Beyoncé Christmas album that Beyoncé never recorded.’
Curiosity
‘What happens when Spotify lets you create a personalised Drake break up song in real time?’
Practical Value
Three AI music startups you could build right now:
A voice vault where artists sell legal access to their own AI voice model
A fan powered song generator used for merch drops or fan club exclusives
A rights tracking watermark that shows when AI has been used in vocals
The Final Note
AI is not going to kill music. It is going to multiply it. Expect more songs, more creators, more bizarre micro genres and more ways to participate.
The Jorja Smith case will be taught in future music law classes. It will be seen as one of the early moments when the industry realised how quickly everything had changed.
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Big takeaway:
AI is making bangers, the labels are scrambling for royalties like loose change behind the sofa and we’re all clinging to live gigs as though they’re the last remaining proof we’re still sentient.
If you need me, I’ll be at a real concert, spending real money, surrounded by real people who definitely don’t know the lyrics. The future can wait; the encore cannot.
See you next week, assuming the algorithms haven’t unionised by then.
That’s it for this week.
Go forth, stay observant and try not to let the culture rot faster than the news cycle.
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