Photo credit: Steve Johnson
Last week, Spotify reportedly blocked new releases from Boomy and pulled several existing tracks made with the AI music generator. Now Boomy has announced that the “curated delivery” of his creations on the platform has been “re-enabled”.
Five-year-old Boomy recently reached out to Digital Music News to announce the end of the distribution hiatus, though Spotify had apparently not issued a public statement on the matter at the time of writing. Despite the growing prevalence of music powered by artificial intelligence — and majors’ reported efforts to stem the tide of certain AI works — the disruption in the boomy Spotify relationship is said to have come from fake streams.
“Supporting artists and creatives using the Boomy platform is a top priority for us,” a spokesperson for the Berkeley-based AI company told DMN. “Boomy is categorically against any kind of manipulation or artificial streaming. We are working with industry partners to address this issue and resume distribution of Boomy artist content on the Spotify platform.”
Despite these comments, when asked, Boomy chose not to disclose how much of his music was actually removed from Spotify. But the disruption doesn’t appear to have seriously impacted the service’s unprecedented performance; According to the platform’s website, users have created a staggering 111,474 songs over the past five days, bringing the total to 14.53 million.
And as mentioned at the outset, Boomy has hinted that it and Spotify have put the fake stream controversy on the back burner.
“We’re excited to announce that curated delivery of new releases from Boomy artists is back on Spotify,” the platform recently wrote on social media. “Supporting our artists and creatives using the Boomy platform is our top priority and we really appreciate your patience over the past few days.”
At the time of writing, Boomy’s Spotify playlists were once again – including but not limited to This Is Boomy (currently with 52 songs), a lo-fi option (84 songs), an EDM variant (62 songs), and an ambient selection (65 songs) – were live.
Of course, Boomy is hardly the only AI music generator these days, and some reports suggest all sorts of (very similar) “songs” are charting streams on Spotify and elsewhere. Additionally, a growing collection of AI-powered sound-like works is still generating millions and millions of cumulative plays on YouTube and social media, while Grimes has caught on to the fast-evolving trend and allowed others to create tracks with an AI rendering of her voice.
According to the Canadian artist’s manager, more than 15,000 people had already used Grimes AI as of last Wednesday, and the UK’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) launched a formal inquiry into the impact of AI on the economy last week.