ROKK, a streaming platform focused on rock and metal music, announced on Monday (July 7) that it will not allow “fully AI-generated music” on its service.
The move comes amid the rise of “fake AI bands” that have generated millions of streams on music streaming platforms.
The driver for ROKK’s new policy appears to be The Velvet Sundown, an entirely AI-generated band that has, so far reached over 1.1 million monthly listeners on Spotify.
Users of ROKK now can flag music they suspect is AI-generated. When a track is reported, ROKK staff will manually examine it and determine whether it should be removed from the platform.
Last month, Spotify rival Deezer introduced what it claimed to be the world’s first AI tagging system for music streaming.
The Velvet Sundown has an AI-generated band ‘photo’ and is ‘verified’ on Spotify, with an official ‘THIS IS…’ playlist on the service. ROKK has posted a screen capture of the band’s Spotify page with a big X mark, accompanying its announcement of banning AI bands from its platform.
“When fake AI bands can flood playlists and fool hundreds of thousands of listeners, it’s clear something’s broken.”
ROKK
ROKK said: “When fake AI bands can flood playlists and fool hundreds of thousands of listeners, it’s clear something’s broken.”
“At ROKK, we’re drawing the line. No bots. No copycats. Just real music by real artists.”
As previously reported by MBW, AI-generated music released by fake artists is rapidly growing in popularity on music streaming services. Aside from The Velvet Sundown, MBW has tracked down other seemingly AI artists like outlaw country artist Aventhis, also verified on Spotify with over 990,000 listeners. The artist’s monthly listeners fell from 1.072 million when MBW reported about it last week.
Another AI band, The Devil Inside, has racked up over 526,000 monthly listeners. They even have a range of merch available online.
ROKK co-founder Alexander Landenburg, who is also a drummer for bands Kamelot and Cyhra, said: “It’s one thing if someone uses technology as part of their creative process. After all, that’s no different from musicians using MIDI packs, amp simulators, or editing tools. What matters is that there’s still a major and meaningful human contribution at the core.
“We draw the line when AI is used to create entire ‘artists’ or ‘bands’ that are completely artificial yet passed off as human, as in “The Velvet Sundown”.
Alexander Landenburg, ROKK
“But we draw the line when AI is used to create entire ‘artists’ or ‘bands’ that are completely artificial yet passed off as human, as in “The Velvet Sundown”. That’s not just soulless, it’s deception. It undermines everything we stand for,” Landenburg was quoted by heavy metal music news website MetalSucks as saying.
The co-founder expressed frustration with how AI-generated content diminishes the value of human artistry, noting that most musicians spend decades “ learning, practicing, failing, sacrificing, and starting over just to reach the point where we can create something that might be meaningful.”
“To see that reduced to something generated in seconds from a text prompt isn’t just disappointing — it’s a slap in the face to every artist who’s put their heart and soul into their craft.
“This must be stopped. That’s why our goal is clear: No Fully AI-Generated Music on ROKK. Please join us in keeping music real.”Music Business Worldwide
