By Mallory Mattingly
An AI-generated country music song just topped charts. Should we be worried?
“Walk My Walk” by Breaking Rust reached “over 3 million streams on Spotify in less than a month,” hitting the No. 1 spot on Billboard’s Country Digital Song Sales chart, GOOD MORNING AMERICA reported.
Some of the lyrics to the song read:
Been beat down, but I don’t stay low
Got mud on my jeans, still ready to go
Every scar’s a story that I survived
I’ve been through hell, but I’m still alive
They say slow down, boy, don’t go too fast
But I ain’t never been one to live in the pastRelated: AI is Splitting Hollywood — Here’s Why
I keep moving forward, never looking back
With a worn-out hat and a six-string strapYou can kick rocks if you don’t like how I talk
I’m gonna keep on talking and walk my walk
Ain’t changing my tone, ain’t changing my song
I was born this way, been loud too long
You can hate my style, you can roll your eyes
But I ain’t slowing down, I was born to rise
So kick them rocks if you don’t like how I talk
I’m gonna keep on talking and walk my walk
“Ultimately, this feels like an experiment to see just how far something like this can go and what happens in the future and in other disciplines of art as well,” Kelley L. Carter, a senior entertainment reporter, told ABC News about AI artists like Breaking Rust.
“AI artists won’t require things that a real human artist will require, and once companies start considering it and looking at bottom lines, I think that’s when artists should rightly be concerned about it,” Carter continued.
That isn’t the only song by the AI-generated artist; the others include: “Livin’ On Borrowed Time,” “Whiskey Don’t Talk Back,” “Kicking Back At The Ground” and “Love Don’t Live Here.”
Billboard acknowledge that other songs created by AI artists like ChildPets Galore, Xania Monet, Unbound Music, Enlly Blue and Juno Skye have reached charts in recent months.
Per Billboard, in the last six months alone, “at least six AI or AI-assisted artists have debuted on various Billboard rankings. That figure could be higher, as it’s become increasingly difficult to tell who or what is powered by AI — and to what extent. Many of these charting projects, whose music spans every genre from gospel to rock to country, also arrive with anonymous or mysterious origins.”
Should musicians and other artists be concerned by AI art? A study by Columbia Business School found that most people still value human creativity.
“Although AI may replicate a style, it can never capture the deep narrative forged by human effort and intuition,” researcher Sheena S. Iyengar said. “The labor, creativity, and passion that characterize human artistry endow each work with an intrinsic value that a machine cannot achieve.”
Time will tell how AI impacts creative industries like music and moviemaking, but it seems that human creativity still holds value.
Read Next: How Spotify is Using AI to Supercharge Artists
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