will.i.am and Sean Paul on embracing artificial intelligence in music
How artificial intelligence will affect our lives going forward is a question being figured out across pretty much all industries right now.
While many in the arts have expressed concerns over how algorithms learn from their work, Black Eyes Peas star will.i.am believes it actually should “inspire you to create”.
An early artificial intelligence supporter, he says: “If you’re basing what you’re going to do tomorrow off yesterday, you’re not growing.”
The music producer spoke to Sky News after giving a demo of his new AI radio app in London.
Rather than artificial intelligence being something with negative connotations, he insists its potential should “inspire better, broader, deeper, faster…[it] shouldn’t stop you from being human”.
The Black Eyed Peas star told Sky News AI should ‘inspire you to create’
As one of the most prominent voices to position himself in the pro-AI camp, his enthusiasm is certainly infectious.
Those who turned out to see the demonstration of his app-based platform RAiDiO.FYI got to see the musician and tech entrepreneur challenge one of his AI personas to make a joke comparing computer chips and guacamole chips with reasonably funny results.
He hopes listeners will come to interact and talk with AI presenters in the not-too-distant future.
But is it a gimmick or a taste of the future?
Sky News put it to will that some of his musical counterparts worry AI – with its instant ability for anyone to make a song in his style – waters down the music industry.
“I don’t think anything can water down our industry any more than TikTok has,” he responded.
“We used to listen to three-minute songs, now we’re down to nine seconds….TikTok and that algorithm, you know, changes what record companies are looking for, changes the architecture of the song… it’s watered down…we an ocean (sic).”
Sean Paul on embracing AI
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Sean Paul explains how he uses AI
But Jamaican dancehall musician Sean Paul isn’t entirely won over by AI’s potential.
“It’s a pandora’s box,” the rapper said, speaking to Sky News, “when you open it, it’s going to change all the parameters. It’s down to you to get used to the game.”
“I am apprehensive about certain parts of [it] in terms of making people lazy to writing”, the 52-year-old, who has worked with countless stars over his 20-year career, said.
“It can become a toy and make music more dispensable.”
Sean Paul. Pic: AP Photo/Matt Sayles
He said he recognises there are copyright and ethical considerations with using AI in the music-making process – especially where algorithms are concerned and they may mimic popular sounds.
He said: “If it does happen that AI takes my stuff and I’m never compensated because of it (…) I will fight that.
“It’s gonna happen. Already though, I feel me, the artist, the creator, I’ve got the short end of the stick for a long time. Even before the days of streaming – we get 0.0 something of the product – and it’s we that created it.”
AI as a ‘tool’
However, he also acknowledged that “times have changed” – and that adapting is key to surviving the ever-changing music industry.
Paul says none of his published music has been touched by AI – but he is open to experimenting with it.
“I’ve used it for trying to finish riddim patterns that I have….I used it as a tool… as I think everybody should.”
Some big names in music, like Sir Paul McCartney and Sir Elton John, have openly called for a legal framework to be established to better protect artists, which will.i.am agrees is paramount “to not always lead with greed, especially with powerful systems” like AI.
“There needs to be some type of artificial intelligence constitution….I believe you should be licensed to put out AIs right now and you’re not.”
AI and copyright concerns
Over 1,000 artists, from Damon Albarn to Kate Bush, recently released a silent album to protest possible changes to UK copyright AI laws.
Dubbed ‘Is This What We Want?’, its aim was to highlight concern for how their work is potentially being used to develop and train the technology.
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While the likes of will.i.am and Sean Paul may be open to seeing where the technology takes them, Alastair Webber believes the government should be taking control rather than loosening the reins.
The co-founder of The Other Songs, an independent music company championing songwriters and artists, says: “We must protect copyright because it really is the economic bedrock of the creative industries that bring so much back.”
The son of composer Lord Lloyd Webber, he believes while it’s important that big figures within the industry like his father are vocal with their concerns, the stand they’re taking is actually for those with their careers ahead of them.
“We’re not talking about these big names like Andrew Lloyd Webber or Elton John, all these people that are getting the headlines supporting this, actually [this matters more] for the young people being born today.”
Donald Trump has said he is considering “taking away” the US citizenship of actress and comedian Rosie O’Donnell, despite a Supreme Court ruling that expressly prohibits a government from doing so.
In a post on Truth Social on Saturday, the US president said: “Because of the fact that Rosie O’Donnell is not in the best interests of our Great Country, I am giving serious consideration to taking away her Citizenship.”
He also labelled O’Donnell, who has moved to Ireland, as a “threat to humanity” and said she should “remain in the wonderful country of Ireland, if they want her”.
O’Donnell responded on Instagram by posting a photograph of Mr Trump with Jeffrey Epstein.
“You are everything that is wrong with America and I’m everything you hate about what’s still right with it,” she wrote in the caption.
“I’m not yours to silence. I never was.”
Rosie O’Donnell moved to Ireland after Donald Trump secured a second term. Pic: AP
O’Donnell moved to Ireland with her 12-year-old son in January after Mr Trump had secured a second term.
She has said she’s in the process of obtaining Irish citizenship based on family lineage and that she would only return to the US “when it is safe for all citizens to have equal rights there in America”.
O’Donnell and the US president have criticised each other publicly for years, in an often-bitter back-and-forth that predates Mr Trump’s move into politics.
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Will Trump address parliament on UK state visit?
This is just the latest threat by the president to revoke the citizenship of someone he has disagreed with, most recently his former ally Elon Musk.
But the two situations are different as while Musk was born in South Africa, O’Donnell was born in the US and has a constitutional right to American citizenship.
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Amanda Frost, a law professor at the University of Virginia School of Law, said the Supreme Court ruled in a 1967 case that the fourteenth amendment of the constitution prevents the government from taking away citizenship.
“The president has no authority to take away the citizenship of a native-born US citizen,” he added.
“In short, we are nation founded on the principle that the people choose the government; the government cannot choose the people.”
The Salt Path author Raynor Winn’s fourth book has been delayed by her publisher.
It comes amid claims that the author lied about her story in her hit first book. Winn previously described the claims as “highly misleading” and called suggestions that her husband had Moth made up his illness “utterly vile”.
In a statement, Penguin Michael Joseph, said it had delayed the publication of Winn’s latest book On Winter Hill – which had been set for release 23 October.
The publisher said the decision had been made in light of “recent events, in particular intrusive conjecture around Moth’s health”, which it said had caused “considerable distress” to the author and her family.
“It is our priority to support the author at this time,” the publisher said.
“With this in mind, Penguin Michael Joseph, together with the author, has made the decision to delay the publication of On Winter Hill from this October.”
A new release date will be announced in due course, the publisher added.
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Winn’s first book, released in 2018, detailed the journey she and husband took along the South West Coast Path – familiarly known as The Salt Path – after they lost their family farm and Moth received a terminal health diagnosis of Corticobasal Degeneration (CBD).
But a report in The Observer disputed key aspects of the 2018 “true” story – which was recently turned into a film starring Jason Isaacs and Gillian Anderson.
Raynor and husband Moth (centre) with actors Jason Isaacs (L) and Gillian Anderson (R). Pic: Steve Tanner/Black Bear
Experts ‘sceptical of health claims’
As part of the article, published last weekend, The Observer claimed to have spoken to experts who were “sceptical” about elements of Moth’s terminal diagnosis, such as a “lack of acute symptoms and his apparent ability to reverse them”.
In the ensuing controversy, PSPA, a charity that supports people with CBD, cut ties with the couple.
The Observer article also claimed the portrayal of a failed investment in a friend’s business wasn’t true, but said the couple – whose names are Sally and Tim Walker – lost their home after Raynor Winn embezzled money from her employer and had to borrow to pay it back and avoid police action.
Anderson played Winn in a movie about the couple’s journey. Pic: Steve Tanner/Black Bear
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It also said that, rather than being homeless, the couple had owned a house in France since 2007.
Winn’s statement said the dispute with her employer wasn’t the reason the couple lost their home – but admitted she may have made “mistakes” while in the job.
“For me it was a pressured time,” she wrote. “It was also a time when mistakes were being made in the business. Any mistakes I made during the years in that office, I deeply regret, and I am truly sorry.”
She admitted being questioned by police but said she wasn’t charged.
The author also said accusations that Moth lied about having CBD/CBS were false and had “emotionally devastated” him.
“I have charted Moth’s condition with such a level of honesty, that this is the most unbearable of the allegations,” Winn wrote on her website.
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