Creative Commons - photo by Vishnu R Nair
With 400,000 monthly Spotify listeners, you may expect a band to find a band currently tearing up social media. Perhaps it may be the statistics of a legacy act with old hits now going viral on TikTok. Yet The Velvet Sundown are neither. Two weeks ago, the band were unheard of, and has since released two albums on Spotify. But the big question is, do they even exist, and does it even matter?
Who Are Velvet Sundown?
The imagery and style of Velvet Sundown would have you believe they are a late sixties/early seventies rock band. Their images contain a band of four guys who look like everyone and no one at the same time. Many of their pictures parody classic rock covers in a very unoriginal way. Standard Abbey Road crossing pictures are included, of course.
The problem is that the band have no digital footprint. They have no names, no social media accounts except ones set up for the band. This week, its sole response has been to exclaim that journalists keep pushing the lazy, baseless theory that The Velvet Sundown is AI-generated. The music itself sounds very much like it has been generated by the AI app Suno. With its inclusion on myriad Spotify playlists, there are theories that it may even be Spotify itself behind it.
Do We Need Authenticity in Music?
One of the big questions is, what is so morally wrong with this? If we look at other forms of entertainment, like TV shows and films, the invention of characters and fictional protagonists is nothing new. Another form of online entertainment, the iGaming sector, is a genre that has embraced fiction, inventing its own characters and franchises to attract more customers. A look at the games on a top provider like Paddy Power Slots shows just how fun and engaging the fictional characters found in their games like Lil’Demon and the Oil Tycoon are. While there are some slot games with licensed images of real people, usually sportsmen, it is the fictional franchises like Big Bass that do better. So why does fiction have no place in music?
Why Do We Crave Authenticity in Music?
Authenticity is to provide something truthful and not a copy. It is this desire for music where the artists have been emotionally involved that the creators of Velvet Sundown have overlooked. Even our pop stars, who often have huge teams of writers telling them what to sing, are people with whom we forge a connection. Even in bands that don’t exist, such as the band The Gorillaz, we still buy into the artistic process.
The future looks bleak for music. Yet it is this desire that will keep it alive. People should and will begin to turn away from this bland music. Just like people seldom listen to elevator music at home, perhaps the AI backlash will be the same. Music is a human experience, and this quite soulless method can never replace it.
