Cardiff-based Holding Absence hit out at the music industry after their musical style was hijacked by an artificial intelligence that is now more popular than them
A British band has blasted the music industry after their music’s style was stolen by artificial intelligence (AI). The “band” would then go on to be extremely successful, causing them to now be more listens on Spotify than the original artists.
Cardiff-based Holding Absence said they were stunned to see the AI band do better than them in terms of streams on Spotify. As a result, they are now calling for more protections for human bands and their intellectual property.
Taking to social media, the band said they were fuming after they explained that the AI “band” had labelled the group as an influence, which only cemented their theory. They branded the move “insulting” and said they are now losing out as a result of the incident.
Writing in a post on X, frontman Lucas Woodland explained: “So, an AI ‘band’ who cite us as an influence (ie, it’s modelled off our music) have just overtaken us on Spotify, in only TWO months. It’s shocking, it’s disheartening, it’s insulting – most importantly – it’s a wake up call.”
Vice reported that Lucas would go on to warn people off listening to AI music, otherwise “bands like us stop existing”. However, with the rise of artificial intelligence across the internet, many fans are unaware that some of their music may be generated using AI itself
Meanwhile, Spotify has said it is going to crack down on AI music on its platforms, and revealed plans to cull some 75 million songs that it suspects is created using AI. This, however, has only applied to so-called “slop” songs and “spammy” songs, meaning that some tracks may slip through the cracks.
The band that stole Holding Absence’s style was Bleeding Verse, an AI band that has already racked up some 2,800 subscribers on Youtube. It also boasts an Instagram page, where its mission statement describes the band as using “AI-assisted instrumentation and vocals” to make music.
When asked about what the ‘band’ lists as its influences, Bleeding Verse cites Holding Absence as a major reference. Within this context, inspiration roughly translates to “scraped their style without permission”, according to the outlet.
The band’s description reads: “Inspired by artists like Dayseeker and Holding Absence, we blend ambient textures, soaring vocals, and poetic lyricism to explore grief, identity, and healing. Lyrics from the heart; AI-assisted instrumentation and vocals.”
Currently, the AI band only has one album available to listen to on Spotify, named “I Became What You Broke”. The album was seemingly released back in July, but already the ‘band’ has been able to amass a huge 897,349 monthly listeners, which is already more compared to Holding Absence which scored 847,638 monthly listeners.
During the course of their career, British band Holding Absence has done well in terms for streams, racking up nearly 90million streams for their top-rated song “Afterlife”, released in 2021. However, the AI ‘band’ has also released a track, “If You Loved Me Then”, which has already made up 2.6million streams since it was first released in July.
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