AI Song & Album Covers (Genre-Swapped, Reimagined) - The Recent YT Video Deluge

[Open Minded Dude]

I wasn't sure if to post it here in the "Art & Music" section or rather in the "AI & Robotics" part of the forum. Since it is still some humans 'behind' it (pushing knobs and adding promts) with their musical intelligence (I hope) I decided on the first. (Mods, if you think it belongs to the other please move it there).

It's happening right now before our eyes and ears. Only in the recent 2-3 months there has been a huge wave of uploads to YouTube with AI-'supported' songs and albums that are 'remakes' of famous rock/pop artists - but in a reimagined genre-changing way.

This has of course been done by human musicians for years (e.g. turning a rock tune into jazz, or pop into metal, etc.), there are even very good cover bands who have been doing this for a long time. However, this is (mostly, or entirely, I guess) AI-driven. The music as well as the accompanying funny artwork.

We all know that AI music is a hot topic and heavily discussed issue in the music industry right now. There are problems due to many insecurities with copyright when AI use an artists music as models. Then there are the many artifical bands/artists who publish "their own music" with "own lyrics". Many people don't like it. Often it still sounds cheap and generic, and yet sometimes some people are confused if it is 'real or not'. I remember I posted some examples of AI 'artists' being criticised in the other general AI thread. I was not so convinced - so far - of the lyrical or musical quality shown either. It still seemed fake.

Again, the videos in this thread are different though since with remakes there are understandably no copyright issues - just the rights of the artist to their original work of course, but YT is full of cover songs anyway, so the usual rules might apply, just as they do for covers by humans, I suppose. Moreover, in some cases the songs/albums are even marked as "AI" by the uploader (which is often only one person I guess). So they are made obvious to be intended as 'fakes' instead of being a real human cover band.

When I clicked on one of the first videos of this kind only about a week ago or so I did not expect anthing great and thought it was the same generic and dull AI slop. I would have liked to bash it too, as usual. Well ...

However, there's a snag to it: Believe it or not, most of it is actually pretty good. Or at least astounding. And fun. And scary. All of it.

Many of these reimagined genre-swapping covers feature a 70s-funky or disco sound, some also 80s music (synth pop). But there's many other examples of source and target genres.

As a musician and consumer of music, I naturally find this new development highly interesting. And it is fun, at least in my ears and eyes. But check for yourselves. There are quite a few channels now doing this (as said, most of them only since very recently!).

I chose some channels as main focus: Conhuir, FAKETUNES, ReGrooved and Fake Music, but you might find other producers/uploaders on the YT sidebar of the videos then.

As you will see, this is going on right now and you can find a lot of recent uploads on all of these channels:

https://www.youtube.com/@FAKETUNES-f6n/videos

https://www.youtube.com/@conhuir/videos

https://www.youtube.com/@FakemusicBr/videos

As many in the 'YT comments section of the videos say, it is very amazing and totally scary at the same time. But decide for yourselves.

Here is only a few examples from the flood of new videos:

First, the two "black albums" of rock music's most famous, AC/DC and Metallica, reimagined as 70s-funk bands:

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=aQLJ4j2d2k4

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=LeRd7xIlmz0

Here's some song examples:

First is ACDC's Back in Black again from another uploader, also as 70s funk:

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=QlAx3Ij3fvc

Here's an iconic indie/alternative rock tune turned into an 80s synth pop song:

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=6hdxnNYxtJs

Here's an 80s synth pop anthem turned into an 80s hard rock / glam rock tune:

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=GX7QQlAeIfs

Depeche Mode 80s song as 90s or 2000s NuMetal:

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=b85Y_1vP_pU

I'm a Rush fan, so here's another 70s disco / funky tune I like a lot:

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=dju4e74Dqf0

And here's the disco Bee Gees going full Heavy Metal:

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=fDwagBmBMcc

You see, I could go on, even further down this rabbit hole, but I'll better stop.


So ... if you find more to be interesting or worth showing, please post it all here.

Or discuss what you think about this recent development. Is it dangerous, scary? Or just good entertainment? Is it good or bad in quality?

Well ... Maybe I am too positive about it but for me - currently - the fun part outweighs the negative aspects for these quirky remakes. I see it as comedy.

But what is your take?

[norman]

It's a phenomenon I'm paying some attention to because it's very 'ear candy' and will become huge, for good or for bad and most likely for both.

I won't get into the bad effects of it, yet, but I can see at least one good thing about A.I. originated music works so far. For decades I've had a backburner ambition, that I assume I will never get done, to create a full blown symphony using or selecting from, all the pop songs of the entire era of my own life in a similar way to how Dvorak experimented with compositions based on folk tunes of Bohemia and Moravia and eventually created his 9th symphony based on folk tunes from Africa and Native American music.

Such a project, as I originally imagined it, would be a massive challenge taking many years of toil to complete. With the way AI is developing now I can easily imagine it could do at least a draft version of such a thing in minutes just from one input line of specifications. I know I'd be fascinated to hear what it would come up with and I'd be interested to find out what variations it would create from tweaked versions of the input request line or different preference lists of modern era pop songs.

[norman]

Here's a pop song that for many years I've automatically converted in my head to a hard rock guitars and drums band sound.

I just searched to see if someone has actually done that yet, as a band or as an AI project. No, nothing turned up except a post on instagram by a guitarist claiming to have done something of that sort with it but I couldn't get it to play for me, probably because I'm not a member of instagram.

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=dVNdTXEJv1A

[Le Chat]

I love the AC/DC one, and truth be told I've no idea what the 'original' album sounds like. Ditto all the other video examples you have given.
So it's all fresh stuff to these ears.

[Open Minded Dude]

My goodness, now it's even Classic. Although Classic and Metal always went well together (just see the whole genre of Symphonic Metal or some Power Metal).

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=HCIY6Hak73k

And for me Beethoven and Bach were always early Metalheads anyway.

[Open Minded Dude]

How about some Metal-Reggea?

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=hol37dbPhUs