If you're anything like me - a child of the 1990s and probably the last generation to know what it was like to navigate a childhood without the internet and social media dominating your every inclination - you’ll probably have mixed feelings about AI. It’s not so much a fear, but a distrust, perhaps. I blame the creepy little android played by Haley Joel Osment in Steven Spielberg’s 2001 film of the same name.
Now, we find AI creeping into our everyday lives. It’s been there for years, of course, from Tesco self-service checkouts to Alexa announcing when your Amazon package will arrive. Now, it’s making its presence felt in the arts, too, and I’m not quite sure how to feel about it.
I’m talking specifically about the 'new’ Beatles song Now and Then, which was completed decades after John Lennon first laid down his vocal. On the one hand, I think it’s a beautiful song and I like it a million times more than Free as a Bird, which (don’t kill me, ELO fans) I reckon suffered from Jeff Lynne’s heavy-handed production when it was released in 1995. On the other hand, where do you draw the line? Although Lennon’s bandmates and his son Sean were adamant that it’s what Lennon would have wanted, how can we know that for sure? Besides all that, does the world really, truly need another Beatles song? Who, you have to ask with your most cynical hat on, is this really for?
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From RTÉ Radio 1's The Ray D'Arcy Show, Dr Martin Clancy, Musician, Academic and industry consultant on the Beatles' new song
And technically, although it's being hailed as a triumph for AI, it’s more a simple progression in technology that allowed film director Peter Jackson (who made 2021’s Get Back docu-series) to isolate John Lennon’s vocals from the original demo. Tomayto, tomahto; it sounds like the beginning of a slippery slope to me. In fact, we’re already on that downward slide. Last year, for example, saw David Guetta mimic Eminem’s voice using AI during a performance, with the French DJ claiming that "the future of music is in AI". That sounds like an incredibly bleak prospect to me.
Guetta’s experiment also highlights a different problem, namely the safeguards - or lack thereof - for artists that protect against their voices being utilised in ways they don’t condone. One of the major sticking points of the recent SAG-Aftra Actors’ Strike was a concern about deepfakes and the increasing use of AI in Hollywood. Shouldn’t the music industry be offered the same protective measures? (She says laughing, while simultaneously acknowledging the likes of Spotify’s royalty rates.)
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Watch, via The Independent: David Guetta recreates Eminem's iconic voice using AI
When I interviewed Noel Gallagher earlier this year, he had some salient opinions (most of them foul-mouthed) on that same point. "It’s music made by d**kheads for d**kheads," he said of AI in music. "It’s some guy in dreadful shoes and s**t jeans has invented this f**king thing; 'Oh look, f**kin’ ‘ell! You can get Paul McCartney singing Highway to Hell by AC/DC’. So f**king what? So what?"
It’s safe to say that Gallagher is not a fan, but the problem with voicing concerns about AI in any respect is that it leaves you open to being called a Luddite; there’s a sense that this is the way things are going, and you’re either along for the ride or you’re gonna get left behind. But for me, it comes down to a simple truth: humans have been creating music for millennia, and we’ve been doing just fine until now. Change can indubitably be a force for good - but only when it makes things better. And at the risk of sounding like your mammy, the possibility of hearing Elvis singing Barbie Girl, or Marvin Gaye crooning the Macarena doesn’t sound much like progress to me.
