There has been considerable discussion about what AI (artificial intelligence) means for music. Many individuals feel that utilizing AI tools to generate music is ethically wrong, explaining that what is generated procedurally by a program is not “music” by any definition. However, I believe that AI music tools can be used to create music that is as valid as an Andy Warhol Campbell soup can or a Roy Liechtenstein panel. With that, I want to talk about some of the best AI artists that are currently producing music as of the writing of this article (May 2024). This is not to say that there are not better artificial intelligence song creators out there now, but just a smattering of those artists that have been sent over by Youtube as “suggested” based on my writing history. Also, I’m fairly sure there are serious artists using AI tools to create music; we’re not covering them here.
Without any further bloviating, here are the top 3 AI humor artists out now:
This Youtube was my first introduction to AI-generated music. By the sheer amount of views that their songs receive, this may be the case for a great many YouTube watchers. Songs like Reyna’s “The Secrets Your Asshole Keeps” is stylistically pure. You can imagine a Tiffany or Belinda Carlisle singing something similar, even if you’d never hear the subject matter broached by these performers. The hooks that are crafted by Obscurest Vinyl are pretty sick too. Early tracks like Rodney Munch’s It’s Time To Take a Shit on the Company’s Dime, a 1980s-infused pop track that feels like an opening for a TV sitcom from that period, are absolute earworms. It is true that eagle-eared listeners can hear a bit of the artificial “fuzziness” and strained syntax present in the song, but the catchiness is so great that listeners can handwave it away. Our favorite Obscurest Vinyl effort has to be the pair of The Sticky Sweethearts songs released by the channel. If you’re into 1960s-esque doo-wop, both “The Shadow of My Wiener” and “I Glued My Balls to My Butthole Again” are must-listens.
This newcomer was the reason I initially wanted to write the article. While the intellectual property is problematic from this performer (they use existing rap lyrics to build a 1970s-funk song around), it’s absolutely amazing to hear some modern classics like Young Jeezy & RackRoll Fresh’s All There or Big Tymers’ Get Your Roll On be given this treatment.
The thick bass line of the All There re-do could easily be imagined as a sample from an Aquemini-era Outkast track or something out of the DJ Screw discography. It’ll be hard for listeners to not bob their heads to the effort. Gender-flipping Lil Boosie’s Set It Off and giving it a twinkling, 1970s-soul veneer is absolutely inspired. The rising strings and call and response style of the vox here make this into a song that easily could slot into a period-accurate movie (if MJW ever makes a Black Dynamite 2, for example). There’s a bit of Cameo and Earth, Wind and Fire influence that is draped around Migos and Takeoff’s Fight Night lyrics that transforms the song into absolute perfection.
Unhinged Records crafts songs in a variety of styles, with an output that is astonishing in how frequent new tracks drop on their channel. Avicii or Vineland fans will love Agribeats’ Do It In My Wellies, a true song of romance that includes lines
like “ride me like a tractor, I’ll plow you like me fields”. Grove Road’s Car Boot Sale links the positive rap of the early 1990s like Arrested Development and P.M. Dawn with the eurodance of C&C Music Factory. Ronnie Starr’s Long One Up The Wrong One Sultry disco hit with a dash of Tom Jones, replete with staccato strings and a thick bass line playing at the bottom of the track. Of the trio of performers covered in this article, I feel that what Unhinged Records does here is the closest to period-accurate that one will be able to find from AI-generated music Youtubers
Follows are a list of solid AI-generated singles that deserve a play or two beyond those discussed earlier:
Ultrapoop Production, I Slammed My Nuts In The Ottoman, (Marty Robbins, Slim Whitman)
That’s What I Call Brainrot!, The Eclipse Blinded Me and I Can’t See Titties Anymore (Travis Tritt, Alan Jackson)
Obscurest Vinyl, Daydreamin’ (John Denver, Paul Simon)
Banned Vinyl Collection, I’m Gonna Cum Inside (Winger, Trixter)
Unhinged Records, Bosom! The Musical [OST] – One Bigger (StarKid, Avenue Q)
Lil Yass, -Tea Baggin’ Time (The Proclaimers, Psychedelic Furs)
There I Ruined It, Simon & Garfunkel sing “Baby Got Back”
Zane Knight, If Sabaton Wrote “Blue Da Ba Dee”
Conclusion
We’re at a place with artificial intelligence-generated music that electronic music was back in the 1960s. A similar amount of ink was spilled about how performers like Klaus Schulze, Wendy Carlos, or Kraftwerk were not of the same caliber of traditional musicians that plopped themselves behind a Steinway. It’s interesting to me how similar the first wave of AI “labels” are to those low-rent companies releasing covers and “inspired by” 7 inch records in the 1950s and 1960s. Various themes – if not song titles – continue to bubble up with the AI Youtube channels after they see that someone has achieved success with glueing something to something.
Like what you like, but it’s hard to deny how much potential AI music has to transform existing musical genres and to allow musicians of different abilities (even disabilities) to craft high-quality stuff. What AI performers did I miss? Want to vent your spleen about how AI music tools are going to destroy music as we know it? Leave me a line below.