AI Monstrosity Goes Bump in the Night

The Music Industry Machine Meets Its Match in AI

From Megan Podsiedlik

Meet Breaking Rust, a country music artist who hit No. 1 on Billboard's Country Digital Song Sales last week. The thing is, “Walk My Walk,” the song that is climbing charts from Breaking Rust's EP “Resilient,” is generated by artificial intelligence. In fact, all the songs, the singing, the music, the writing, and even the likeness of the artist are AI. 

Outlets like Time Magazine and Digital Music News have been quick to downplay the latest AI artist to infiltrate the airwaves. Instead of calling out the exploitation of existing talent, Time focused on the “feeding frenzy” likely orchestrated by those behind the AI-generated artist for using outrage bait to gain momentum on the charts. 

“The permissiveness of Billboard with their charts has been a systemic problem for many years, especially in country music—and that’s what's facilitating this whole news cycle,” Kyle Coroneos, the founder of Saving Country Music, told Time. 

Arguing over whether an AI artist’s success is organic or due to a marketing scheme seems meaningless. It’s no secret that taste-making in the cultural space is a systematic public relations game. “I welcome the chaos,” Taylor Swift recently said after receiving backlash for her latest album, “The Life of a Showgirl.” “The rule of show business is, if it’s the first week of my album release and you are saying either my name or my album title, you’re helping.”

What’s more interesting is that artists like Breaking Rust—and all these other successful AI artists, including Xania Monet, who was the first AI R&B singer created by Telisha "Nikki" Jones to debut on a Billboard radio chart and signed a multimillion-dollar record deal; AI country chart topper Cain Walker; and The Velvet Sundown, an AI-generated psychedelic rock band—call into question what original music actually is and how royalties are distributed. 

“I hear from the music community frequently,” Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti told WKRN. “They are very, very concerned with training data being used. There are proposals out there to try to remedy this.”

If you’re able to infiltrate the market using existing artistic input to create new music, how can the industry draw a line in the sand regarding intellectual property? It’s one thing to hold the creators of AI “artists” accountable for using Dolly Parton’s vocal profile on a track to generate spins, but it’s hard to nail down liability for an AI-generated artist created using a mixture of existing artistic profiles.

Tennessee has spearheaded the fight against this AI monstrosity. Last year, the legislature passed the Ensuring Likeness Voice and Image Security (ELVIS) Act, which regulates the use of artificial intelligence in the music industry. That said, regulation is always two steps behind innovation.

Ultimately, it’s a war between the living and the unliving. Meanwhile, the consumer continues to play the pawn in this battle over whether AI art is a new manifestation of all who came before, or a pieced-together creature brought to life in Victor Frankenstein’s lab of AI creativity.

Assuming that the market can fend off AI by way of condemning the very tactics the industry so blatantly uses to buoy its own success seems a losing strategy. They, themselves, created the very apparatus in which consumers can be persuaded into accepting art that thrives via market manipulation. So, who's to judge when the art brought to life is cold to the touch? Perhaps an angry mob wielding pitchforks.

HEADLINES

• 🏠 Call to reform property tax limits in Tennessee. As one of only four states without a cap on property tax increases, the Beacon Center of Tennessee is pushing a bill that would require all property tax hikes to be approved by voters. (Fox 17)
• 🗣 Metro Council launched their own Bluesky account. This month, the Metro Council Office is celebrating the one-year anniversary of its official social media presence, marking a successful year of improved communication and community engagement. (Metro Nashville)
• 🍎 Full SNAP benefits are back. The Tennessee Department of Human Services announced that households will receive full backpay for their Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits starting today. (NewsChannel5)
• 🌊 Body retrieved from Cumberland River. Emergency units responded after a person jumped off the Victory Memorial Bridge into the water on Saturday. According to the Nashville Police Department, the incident appeared to be a suicide. (WSMV)
• 🗂 Trump encourages House Republicans to release the Epstein files. On Sunday, President Donald Trump asked the House to vote in favor of the Epstein Files Transparency Act, with a vote possible as early as Tuesday. (NewsChannel5)

DEVELOPMENT

• Moto Moda brings pizza, vintage motorcycles to Wedgewood-Houston (NBJ)
• All or Nothing Bagels opens first storefront location (Post)
• Wells Fargo continues expansion with new East Nashville branch (Post)
• Planning Commission OKs rezonings for trio of proposals (Post)
• BNA begins construction of rental car facility, parking garage (Post)

THINGS TO DO

View our calendar for the week here.

📅 Visit our On The Radar list to find upcoming events around Nashville.

🎧 On Spotify: Pamphleteer's Picks, a playlist of our favorite bands in town this week.

👨🏻‍🌾 Check out our Nashville farmer's market guide.

TONIGHT

🪕 Leif Vollebekk @ The Basement East, 8p, $36.01, Info

🎸 Triathlon @ The Blue Room, 7p, $26, Info

🪕 Bluegrass Monday with Kyle Tuttle Band @ Dee's Lounge, 6p, $10, Info

🪕 Val Storey, Carl Jackson, Larry Cordle & New Monday @ Station Inn, 8p, $20, Info

💀 Grateful Monday @ Acme Feed & Seed, 7p, Free, Info

🕺 Motown Monday @ The 5 Spot, 9p, $5, Info

📰 Check out the full newsletter archive here.

Today's newsletter is brought to you by Davis Hunt, Megan Podsiedlik and Camelia Brennan.