Billie Eilish, The Last Dinner Party and Pearl Jam among signatories of open letter demanding artist protection against AI

Over 200 high-profile musicians have signed an open letter calling for protections against the predatory use of artificial intelligence that mimics human artists’ likenesses, voices and sound.

Signatories include artists of every genre and generation such as megastars Billie Eilish, Nicki Minaj, The Last Dinner Party, to rock n' roll hall of famers such as Jon Bon Jovi, R.E.M and Pearl Jam.

The letter was also signed by the estates of Frank Sinatra and Bob Marley.

The 'Stop Devaluing Music' Letter asks tech firms, AI developers and music and social media platforms to pledge not to develop AI tools that undermine or replace human songwriters and artists.

"We must protect against the predatory use of Al to steal professional artists' voices and likenesses, violate creators rights, and destroy the music ecosystem" the letter states.

Rather than call for an outright ban ion the development of Artificial Intelligence systems, the open letter ask that these companies "pledge that they will not develop or deploy Al music- generation technology, content or tools that undermine or replace the human artistry of songwriters and artists or deny us fair compensation for our work".

Acknowledging the potential benefits of such technologies the statement reads: "We believe that, when used responsibly, Al has enormous potential to advance human creativity and in a manner that enables the development and growth of new and exciting experiences for music fans everywhere".

The Artist Rights Alliance letter is part of an industry-wide pushback from artists and creators against the use of generative artificial intelligence.

Issues surrounding the generating of content in similar styles to existing creatives was at the heart of the recent Hollywood Writer's strike.

Even major creative companies take issue with the widespread use of generative AI, with Universal Music suing lyric generator platform Anthropic for training its AI software using Universal's catalogue.

In March of this year, Tennessee became the first US state to enact legislation directly intended to protect musicians from having their vocal likeness generated by AI for commercial purposes.

The Ensuring Likeness, Voice, and Image Security Act or “Elvis Act” goes into effect on 1 July, and makes it illegal to replicate an artists’ voice without their consent. That legislation did not address artists’ work being used as data to train AI models.

Estates representing deceased artists are also among the signatories to the letter amid increased debates within the entertainment industry on the ethics of replicated late artists. One recent and popular example was the use of AI to recreate John Lennon's voice from a damaged demo to create "new' Beatles song 'Now and Then'. 

The letter sates that "Unchecked, Al will set in motion a race to the bottom that will degrade the value of our work and prevent us from being fairly compensated for it".