MBW Reacts is a series of analytical commentaries from Music Business Worldwide written in response to major recent entertainment events or news stories. Only MBW+ subscribers have unlimited access to these articles. The below article originally appeared in Tim Ingham’s latest MBW+ Review email, issued exclusively to MBW+ subscribers this week.
This column is plagiarized.
But at least – unlike certain AI platforms currently trying to wriggle free of lawsuits? – I’m willing to admit it.
The words below are not mine; they belong to Charli XCX.
This was not supposed to happen. Before the architect of Brat Summer swaggered on stage at the Ivor Novello Awards in London on Thursday (May 22), I had a different editorial planned. One that covered the hilarity of Anthropic – defending its lawsuit against Universal Music Group – admitting not only that it used its gen-AI platform, Claude, to write its latest legal submission… but that Claude actually ‘hallucinated’ false information within it.
On the flip side, I also wanted to dive into a gladdening, positive use of AI.
As a 40-something male from the UK’s ‘regions’, I am naturally an Oasis obsessive. A week or so ago, a 32-second clip of Liam Gallagher singing an old Oasis demo – The Good Rebel – leaked onto Reddit. The recording, dating back to around 2005, was never officially released.
A different version of The Good Rebel, however, was officially released. When Noel went ‘solo’ in 2011, he re-recorded several unreleased/demo songs that were initially destined for Oasis albums but never made the cut, singing them sans frere.
A fellow Oasis obsessive has now used gen-AI tech to seamlessly merge these two recordings (Noel’s version from 2011 plus the leaked Oasis/Liam clip from 2005), and the result – check it here – is one of the most joyful things I’ve poured into my ears for months.
The fact that royalties from this new fan-made creation won’t flow in the right direction is a problem for the music biz to solve – not to be afraid of.
But yeah, then Charli saunters onto the Ivors stage to collect ‘Songwriter Of The Year’, head to toe in black, all Neo-from-the-Matrix couture.
She didn’t explicitly mention artificial intelligence, at all.
But her message (“dare to suck!”) distilled a powerful antidote against a slithering fear for human creators: their inability to compete with machine-driven perfection.
Read the highlights of what she said below, and/or watch the video of Charli’s full speech here.
“Okay… unpopular opinion – and please don’t kill me for saying this – but I have never particularly believed that the idea that ‘everything starts from a great song’ is real.
“I’m sorry, I know that’s really not good for this room! But it’s my belief.
“In my head, a great song alone has never actually been enough to captivate an audience.
“A song with a distinct identity, coupled with a point of view and a potent culture surrounding it, and, above all, conviction, is what can catapult a songwriter from being technically good to globally renowned.
“As I’m sure you all agree, I am hardly Bob Dylan. But one thing I certainly do is ‘commit to the bit’.
“Examples of my lyrical ‘genius’ include, ‘I want to dance, to me, me, me, me, me / When I get to the club, club, club, club, club…’ [applause and cheers]. Thank you.
“Also: ‘I’m everywhere, I’m so Julia’, which some people might describe as vapid and nonsensical, but I would – unpretentiously – describe as Warholian and reflective of the cultural brainrot of our time [more applause and cheers].
“As a songwriter but above all as an artist, conviction is everything. You literally die without it.
“It separates the frauds from the greats. The good singers from the trendsetters.
“It’s Duchamp’s Fountain. It’s Denniz Pop. It’s David f***ing Lynch.
“It’s an undeniable sense of style and personality. And of course it’s embracing the idea of ‘Daring to suck’.
“In my opinion, writing with no fear and no agenda – other than making something totally reflective of who you are – [creates] the best songs: songs that can soundtrack a night out, a summer, or possibly even define a moment in time.
“So, to all the songwriters in the room… I think there are some here, but there are also a lot of lawyers and stuff – shout out Nicky Stein, love you baby! [laughs].
“To all the songwriters in the room, I can just say: do it for your f***ing self.
“Make what you want to hear and not what an A&R person has requested of you. Make something for the niche and not something broad. Don’t try and be clever, be dumb! Have fun and play your songs to your friends.
“And above all, don’t be afraid of yourself or of your own internal language.
“That’s the thing that makes you, distinctly you.”Music Business Worldwide
