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Australia’s recorded music industry will bar tracks wholly generated by artificial intelligence from official charts as burgeoning generative technologies threaten artists’ livelihoods, a representative said.
The crackdown comes as a variation of Madonna’s pop hit “Like a Prayer” created by an Australian producer using AI-generated vocals and drums has spent 16 weeks in the Australian top 20, stoking debate about generative AI’s place in music. It peaked at number two on the Australian Record Industry Association’s (ARIA) top 20 Australian singles chart in May and remained in fourth place in August 25.
Wholly AI-generated tracks will be banned from the ARIA charts, but some AI-assisted music will remain eligible, an ARIA statement said. Tracks can be eligible only if “humans wrote the song and performed the lead vocal and the primary instruments,” among other requirements, the statement said. AI-generated music would also be ineligible for the Australian industry’s prestigious ARIA awards.
ARIA chief executive Annabelle Herd said, “These changes reflect our intent to remain dynamic and promote the human nature of artistry in what is—to say the least—a rapidly developing space.”
“The ARIA Charts will always remain a transparent measurement of the music Australia consumes, but a chart that rewards unlicensed AI output would undercut the very basis of the recorded music we exist to represent,” Herd added.
Eligible music must also be produced using legal AI services.
The Australian rules are in step with new principles released in July by the London-based International Federation of the Phonographic Industry. The federation represents the recording industry worldwide.
The international guidelines state that to qualify for official music charts, a track must be “substantially human-made.”
Sydney Conservatorium of Music composer and lecturer Alexis Weaver told Australian Broadcasting Corp. the debate around AI in music was “exceptionally fraught and very emotional for a lot of musicians, and so everyone will have a different opinion.”
This article was provided by The Associated Press.