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The music company representing award-winning singer Jorja Smith has stated its desire to claim a share of earnings from a track it asserts was produced using an artificial intelligence "clone" of the singer's distinctive voice.

The song, titled 'I Run' by British dance act Haven, achieved widespread popularity on social media last October, in part due to its smooth R&B singing by an uncredited woman vocalist.

Although its momentum and impending chart entry in both UK and US, the song was subsequently removed by leading streaming platforms after industry bodies issued copyright requests, alleging it breached intellectual property law by impersonating another artist.

Although 'I Run' has now been reissued with completely new vocals, Smith's label, FAMM, insists it believes the initial version was generated with AI programmed on her body of recordings and is now seeking appropriate redress.

A Larger Issue at Stake

"This is not only about one artist. This is bigger than a single performer or a single track," the label wrote in a public statement.

FAMM also expressed its view that "both versions of the track infringe on Jorja's rights and unfairly take advantage of the work of all the songwriters with whom she works."

Famous for songs like 'Be Honest' and 'Little Things', Smith was crowned Best British Female at the prestigious Brit Awards in 2019.

Suggesting that her fans were possibly deceived by Haven's original track, the label added: "Our industry must not allow this to be the new normal."

Producers Acknowledge Using AI Technology

The duo behind the track have openly admitted using AI in its production process.

Songwriter Harrison Walker clarified that the initial voice were in fact his own but were heavily altered using AI music software Suno, sometimes called the "advanced tool for music".

Meanwhile, the other producer, Waypoint, whose real name is Jacob Donaghue, stated on social media that AI was used to "give our original vocal a female tone".

Donaghue and Walker assert that they wrote and created the song themselves and have even shared files of their original production sessions.

"This shouldn't be mystery that I used AI-assisted vocal editing to convert solely my voice for 'I Run'," Walker said.

"Being a creator and maker, I enjoy experimenting with new tools, techniques and remaining on the forefront of industry trends," he added.

"In order to set the record straight, the people behind HAVEN are actual and people, and all we want to do is make great music for fellow humans."

Legal Gray Areas and Industry Implications

While their first version of 'I Run' was suspended from major charts, the replacement version managed to break into the UK Top 40 last week.

FAMM has framed the entire episode as a critical test case for the music industry's evolving interaction with AI.

The label stated it had "a duty to voice concerns" and "encourage public discourse", because AI is advancing at an "rapid rate and substantially outpacing legal oversight".

"Computer-created material should be transparently labelled as such so that the audience may choose whether they consume it or not," the message continued.

Artists as 'Collateral Victims'

Smith endorsed her label's position on her personal Instagram profile.

The text warned that musicians and songwriters were turning into "unintended casualties in the race by policymakers and corporations towards AI dominance".

It also noted that the label would distribute any potential royalties with the collaborators behind Smith's music.

"If we are successful in establishing that AI helped to compose the lyrics and melody in 'I Run' and are granted a portion of the song, we would aim to allocate each of Jorja's co-writers with a pro-rata share," it detailed.

The Continuing Growth of Computer-Generated Music

The proliferation of AI-generated music has been a source of both fascination and consternation for the entertainment world.

• In the summer, the band Velvet Sundown gathered vast numbers of streams before revealing they used AI to aid develop their sound.
• Last month, an AI-generated "artist" called Breaking Rust led a US genre sales chart, demonstrating that listeners are not necessarily averse to consuming computer-generated music.
• Suno was previously taken to court for copyright infringement by the industry's major largest record labels, but those legal actions have since been settled.

Subsequently, Warner Music entered into a partnership with the firm, which will enable users to create songs using the voices, names, and images of Warner acts who agree to the program.

However, it remains unclear how many well-known musicians will agree to such applications of their identity.

Just last week, a group of renowned artists such as Sir Paul McCartney, Annie Lennox, Damon Albarn, and Kate Bush released a vinyl album featuring tracks of silence or audio of empty studios in protest to proposed revisions to intellectual property regulations.

They argue these changes would make it easier for AI companies to train systems using copyrighted work without securing a permission.