AI-Generated Music Is Siphoning Streams from Artists in Seattle and Beyond

Artificial intelligence is still making headlines for all the ways it can make our lives easier, taking care of tedious tasks like helping you coordinate multiple schedules and providing budgeting tips. Increasingly, though, AI is making its way into the music industry — not just through production tools, but also on streaming platforms like Spotify. 

A former Seattle band says they were listed as a collaborator on an album they didn’t write. In fact, they claim it was AI-generated. 

Context on the Larger Issue

We’ve previously reported on how AI is making waves in the way we make music, including the Beatles using AI to extract John Lennon’s voice from a demo tape and how AI is trying to do the work of radio DJs. 

This time feels different — and by different, I mean more existential. 

This story is about how people are using AI to not only write music, but also siphon streams from music made by actual humans. 

If you search on YouTube, you’ll find several videos supposedly instructing you on how easy it is to make money by uploading AI-generated music to platforms like Spotify. Some claim they’ve earned thousands of dollars. 

I think the most lucrative version of this to date earned one man in North Carolina $10 million dollars. According to the New York Times, he was arrested in September on charges including “wire fraud and money laundering conspiracy.” In this case, the issue wasn’t just that he made AI-generated music; he also set up a streaming bot that would rack up the play count. (Remember, Spotify pays out artists based on high play counts.) The man in question denies any charges of fraud. 

However, this story isn’t about the North Carolina man, let alone anything on the scale of $10 million dollars. This is a story closer to home — Seattle, to be exact. 

Salo and Joy Wants Eternity

Salo is a composer living in Los Angeles, currently active in multiple projects, including Cowboy Cinema and Holy Sun Opera House. Before these, he played keys in a Seattle-based instrumental group called Joy Wants Eternity. The fact that they had no vocals will be important later. 

Joy Wants Eternity falls squarely into the school of post-rock, yet their sound is distinctive. The way they use reverb, the fact that their drummer is self-trained, and the fact that Salo brings operatic training to a rock sound. It’s important to emphasize their level of fame as it relates to this story, too. Even though they never made it quite as big as other instrumental bands like Explosions in the Sky or Sigur Rós, they consistently rise to the surface on Reddit and other spaces where you find instrumental rock enthusiasts. So, kind of underground, but still recognizable. 

Over their lifetime as a band, they wrote three albums: their debut Must You Smash Your Ears Before You Learn to Listen with Your Eyes (2005), their second album You Who Pretend to Sleep (2007), and their final album The Fog Is Rising (2012). 

Before they officially disbanded, they also had a unique opportunity to provide the soundtrack for a documentary about Peelander-Z, a Japanese punk band based in Austin, Texas. 

In 2015, the band called it quits on good terms. Life went on for the members. Many of them started families and couldn’t commit to regular practice. 

Discovering the AI Tracks

This past fall, Salo received a message from one of his old guitarists. There were mysterious new entries on their Spotify account nearly a decade after Joy Wants Eternity called it quits. 

“It was something called What Remains of Edith Finch — which, I’m pretty sure that’s a video game,” Salo said. “And then there was another one called As Above, So Below.” 

As Above, So Below came out in August 2024 from an artist called The Illusory Explainer, who listed two bands as “collaborators” on the album: Industries of the Blind and Joy Wants Eternity. People were texting Salo, surprised yet excited that Joy Wants Eternity was (supposedly) writing new music. 

Again, let me remind you: Joy Wants Eternity has not written music together in nearly 10 years. 

“If anything, it’s just kind of embarrassing because it’s not good music,” Salo laughed. “Like, who listened to that and thought, ‘Oh man, Joy Wants Eternity really went downhill.’ That was the more embarrassing part to me, that people thought that was one of our real releases.” 

This is how I caught wind of the story. Salo reposted something from a friend on social media, almost like a warning label on a toxic substance. 

Salo said that, based on the instruments in the mix — even down to the drumming style — AI is the culprit, and someone referenced Joy Wants Eternity as part of the prompt. 

“They very clearly put our names in there,” he said. 

Another reason Salo believes As Above, So Below is AI-generated is because there are lo-fi glitchy sounds during drum crashes and piano notes. Perhaps the biggest giveaway of all is the fact that Salo doesn’t perceive a melody in the music. 

“It was, like, trying to be a melody, but it was impossible for you to hum that melody,” he said. “There’s some music you think of where you’re like, ‘Oh wow, I never would have thought of that.’ But this was just dull and boring. You could tell right away that there was just something off about it.” 

Salo isn't the only one raising an eyebrow here. There’s a Reddit thread about this album. You can see users playing amateur detective, some saying “no, it sounds like AI, and nobody is this prolific,” others saying “no, it seems legit because x y z reason,” and one person even praising the music as “a good find.” 

Again, the fact is that Joy Wants Eternity had nothing to do with writing this album. 

So, how does a musician expunge something fraudulent from their Spotify page? 

Unlike Bandcamp, you have to go through a middleman, i.e. a service that distributes music on your behalf, such as DistroKid or CD Baby. Salo already reached out to Spotify and didn’t hear back, so he went through his distributor, CD Baby, which estimates that about 2 million artists use its service. So, it’s not like Salo had VIP access to voice his complaint. 

“They send you an email like, ‘We’ll get back to you, and the waiting time is six months,’” Salo recalled. “It’s like, there’s no way you’re going to sit there with an album that isn’t even yours for like six months.” 

For the record, I reached out to Spotify, but I didn’t hear back. According to an article from Slate, Spotify and YouTube don’t have rules against using AI, but they do have rules against impersonation. 

Who Is The Illusory Explainer? 

This is where the story takes a bit of a turn. Salo tried to reach out to The Illusory Explainer, but he had no luck. I also reached out to The Illusory Explainer back in October. 

To my surprise, he wrote back. 

According to his SoundCloud page, The Illusory Explainer is a one-man post-rock project from Iran. In his email, he wrote: 

“I have included the names of the musicians from whom I drew inspiration for that album as a sign of respect (I am not very familiar with music regulations). I have no financial backing, and all the songs have been recorded and released from my bedroom. [...] The use of artificial intelligence seems rather amusing.”

To me, this implies one of two things: He either has no idea how copyright law works in the United States, or else — as both Salo and I suspect — he used AI to generate tracks and tagged Joy Wants Eternity as a contributing artist to attract streams from their official page to get ears on his Spotify page. 

I have since invited The Illusory Explainer for a conversation and asked for proof that he wrote this music, but as of this publication, I have not heard back. 

A Legal Perspective

Henderson Cole is a music lawyer based in New Jersey. He’s also worked in record labels, and even at MTV. He’s not litigating this specific case, but he has a few hunches about what happened here. 

“This person may have created this using AI, they may be lying, they may be a real person who doesn’t understand how copyright works and they’re trying to copy stuff, maybe they’re copying and pasting elements from the original song, they might be doing a little illegal sampling,” Henderson said. 

Even though Henderson has been practicing law for nearly a decade, I have to give a necessary disclaimer: Everything you’re about to read is not legal advice. Consult a lawyer if you’re facing a specific dispute with your art. 

Also, Henderson confessed up front that he doesn’t have a favorable opinion of AI in creative spaces like this. 

“The standard way that AI has been abused to create music is to use AI to be trained on someone else’s music to create something similar enough that you can attract some attention away from them, or replace some of their listens, or something like that,” Henderson explained. “What made this kind of unique is that [The Illusory Explainer] listed [Joy Wants Eternity] as a collaborator, which exposed the creator because it made it easier to find where he got this inspiration. I think it had something to do with that, they were kind of hoping to pull from fans of the original band.” 

Fortunately, even if U.S. copyright law can’t prevent infringement, it also doesn’t protect AI-generated work. 

“The U.S. Copyright Office, as they’re going through this, has said that if you create something using an AI program, that’s not copyrightable,” Henderson said. “One of the aspects is that it needs to be created by a human, and the prompt alone is not enough.”

I told Henderson about Salo’s situation — that he thinks someone used his old band to feed a music-making AI bot — and Henderson says this sounds pretty likely. But what’s the incentive? Making $10 million dollars like the North Carolina man? 

“This isn’t a very profitable situation in the long term,” Henderson said. “You could pull off an internet scam involving AI music and make little money, but probably it won’t be the best use of your time, and it might be risky. The more likely chance is that somebody is using AI music to gain some sort of popularity as if it’s real, as if they created it.” 

Even if The Illusory Explainer is not trying to earn money from Spotify’s monthly distribution pool, he is gaining recognition (even as you read this very article). Plus, whether it’s millions of dollars or just pennies, there is ultimately an implication to the bottom line. 

“When plays are sent out to these fake artists and fake like songs, they are pulling money away from other artists and reducing their royalty rates by creating more plays to their song,” Henderson said. 

“I think, overall, AI is creating digital waste, or digital pollution.” 

Digital waste. 

What problem are we solving when we have robots do creative work? What does that do to make human lives better? 

“The problem was never that there weren’t enough songs. We need good songs, we don’t need more. There's become a bloat of too many songs. I’m not sure what problem it’s solving. The public good doesn’t seem like it’s being served. In this specific case, it’s creating problems for a specific artist who is being imitated. There are also hundreds more — thousands more cases of this happening. It’s going to be very difficult to rein that in or stop it until there’s some major changes.”

When it comes to “major changes” in a legal sense, nothing groundbreaking has really come forward from lawmakers to protect artists. The most recent effort was from April 2024, when California Congressman Adam Schiff proposed a bill that would require AI companies to disclose if they’re using copyrighted material. 

This sounds useful in theory, but it’s unclear how this would halt unethical uses of AI in music streaming, especially since Pandora’s box is already open. Moreover, the bill hasn’t moved forward since it was introduced to the house earlier this year. 

Henderson says Congress is — once again — kicking the can down the road. 

“With a government that’s functioning slowly, it isn’t able to respond to these things fast enough. And, the streaming services — especially if they’re not based in the United States — they’re dealing with different laws. It’s a tangled mess. And who’s paying for it in the end? The creators. They’re the only ones really getting hurt.” 

If the answer doesn’t reveal itself through government action, Henderson predicts a “legal armageddon” between copyright holders and AI companies. In the meantime, he’s very much a fan of unionizing and organizing among creative workers. 

The Future of Music in the Face of AI

Let’s remember that there are some acceptable (dare I say good) uses of AI in creating music. Henderson reminds us that, while he’s definitely concerned, there have been other disruptions to the music industry in the past, like when T-Pain brought autotune to the mainstream in the early 2000s. We all came out (relatively) unscathed from that. 

Salo even says he’s experimented with AI in his own creative process. 

If you’re just wanting to do a quick master of something, there are tools to [...] analyze other songs so you can have the same mastering style as this or that,” Salo said. “So, I guess there are use-cases for it as a utility. [...] It gives me an idea of what’s missing, but I always end up going to someone who actually does mastering. I don’t think there’s a replacement for that.” 

Henderson offered perspectives on the best ways for everyday fans to support human-made art. 

“At the end of the day, you want to support the creative people that you want to keep doing this,” Henderson said. “That might mean buying merch, but that might also mean donating money to them. If you walk up to an artist at a show and give them a tip, I don’t think they’ll complain. That is a really important part of the music industry, just attending things, going to concerts, supporting artists when they’re coming up, going to a concert where you don’t know the artist, and if you like them or not, that’s okay.” 

Henderson also reflects on the beauty of imperfection when humans make art. 

“Neil Peart used to say that his drumming in Rush was imperfect, but that was better than with a metronome. Humans are imperfect, and that’s what makes us connect to other humans.” 

Speaking from an artist’s perspective, Salo echoed this bid for connection. He says yes, definitely attend live shows and buy merch, but also don’t be shy about gushing to your favorite bands, whether that’s in their DMs or at a venue. 

“I do like it when people just kind of reach out and send a comment or something,” Salo said, adding that Bandcamp is a good vehicle for fans to send messages to artists. 

“I’m not sure if Spotify really helps us. We don’t really make money on that. We’re just kind of there because you have to be. And maybe there’s a future where we don’t have our music on Spotify.” 

As a music fan himself, Salo is distancing himself from streaming altogether. He’s committed to buying physical media to listen to music — vinyl, tape, CDs, you name it. 

“I like trying to go back to the way it used to be, where you have to seek out those albums or go into a record store and chat it up with the clerk, asking what’s cool. I think there’s something there when you buy something, take it home, and it’s the worst thing you’ve ever heard. It’s still kind of a fun experience to do that,” he laughed. 

In the end, As Above, So Below was removed from streaming platforms after about two months. Salo took a direct approach and did something that you and I can do: He hit the “report spam” button on several streaming platforms. Salo also thinks it’s possible that The Illusory Explainer removed the album of their own accord. 

And so, Salo’s struggle with AI music ends here (for now). Joy Wants Eternity still has a tremendous catalog. Although you can still find As Above, So Below listed as an album, it’s really hard to stream the actual tracks. 

Salo remains motivated, continuing to write new music and perform live with Cowboy Cinema and Holy Sun Opera House. When it comes to the threat of AI, Salo remains vigilant yet levelheaded. 

“I’m not really sure how you can prevent any of this from happening again,” Salo said. “I don’t know what’s stopping anyone from doing this tomorrow. [...] It’s hard to say anything about the future of AI. I feel like you can either be the fool or the prophet when talking about the future. We’ll see.” 

As of now, I haven’t found any statements from these major streaming platforms committing to help reduce “digital waste,” to borrow Henderson’s term. It seems like we’re on a one-way ticket to “legal armageddon” — some pending cases could make all the difference. For example, according to Music Business Worldwide, two major AI music apps are currently being sued by three major players in copyright. We’re waiting to see what comes of this case, as well as Adam Schiff’s bill if it ever gets back to the House floor. 

In the meantime, I take heart in what motivates people like Salo to keep making music: It’s not about counting streams or making money. It’s about the connection he’s making with his collaborators and fellow music lovers.