PG Music Home Forums General Discussion Off-Topic AI and the Future

Nice song and vocals.

The idea of using AI for Randy's voice didn't come from his team, but from Warner Music Nashville Co-President Cris Lacy. My guess is that Warner Music thought the best way to introduce AI vocals was with a "feel good" story, and Randy was happy to oblige. In fact, that's exactly what they say in a press release:


From a technological perspective, the AI vocals something more akin to RVC, in that they need a "real" vocalist to sing the song. James Dupré was that vocalist. He was someone who had toured with Randy after his stroke, performing as Randy's voice. So they'd obviously had a good working relationship.

The recording used for Randy's song was one that James had done decade earlier, but was never released.

I initially thought this was cool since everyone involved was fully informed, but that's not the full story.

Rolling Stone wrote that James "was just as surprised as everyone when he heard Randy Travis’s AI-assisted vocal", noting that "Dupré was stunned when he realized that it was actually his voice he was hearing, at least in part."

James was paid for the rights to use his performance. But Rolling Stone writes that the Warner rep "declined to specify whether it was a one-time work-for-hire payment or if Dupré will participate in royalties."

And instead of giving James "sung by" credit, Warner created a new “vocal bed” tag that was coincidentally ready be rolled out just in time for the song.

I've got to wonder: Warner got a hold of an AI team in London, supplied them with vocal stems to 54 of his songs, got together musicians to create the backing for the song, and paid producers to spent months to work on the track.

How could they have forgotten to contact James about using his vocals?

My gut feeling is that Warner wouldn't spend all that money on the song if there was the slightest chance that James wouldn't allow them to use his vocals. I'd bet that Warner's lawyers had already concluded James' track had been "work for hire", and conveniently could be used however Warner wanted. This included use as the basis of an AI vocal - something that didn't even exist when it was recorded.

I would hope that James a bit of additional compensation, because who wants to have the a feel good story about the ethical use of AI ruined by the "vocal bed" singer? At the same time, I doubt that they wanted to set a precedent of "vocal bed" tracks being eligible for royalties. If they were, they wouldn't have evaded the question when asked.

While some news articles were quick to point out that the basis of the song was James' performance, it was notably absent elsewhere.

James isn't even mentioned on the YouTube video credits, and reading articles like the one in The Los Angeles Times, you'd never know any vocalist other than Randy was involved in the creation of the song.

What's problematic is that James' performance of the song wasn't good enough to release, but it was good enough to use as the "vocal bed" that was overlaid with Randy Travis' voice. Not really surprising, though.

All in all, a bit less of a "feel good" story for me.