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The record label representing award-winning artist Jorja Smith has stated its desire to receive a share of royalties from a track it asserts was created using an AI "clone" of the singer's distinctive voice.

The song, titled 'I Run' by UK dance act Haven, gained widespread popularity on social media in October, in part due to its smooth soul singing by an unnamed female vocalist.

Despite its success and potential chart position in both UK and US, the song was later banned by leading streaming platforms after industry bodies issued takedown requests, alleging it violated copyright by impersonating another artist.

Even though 'I Run' has since been reissued with different vocals, Smith's label, FAMM, maintains it is convinced the initial version was generated with AI trained on her extensive recordings and is now seeking appropriate redress.

A Broader Principle at Stake

"The situation is not only about one artist. It's bigger than one artist or a single track," the label stated in a recent announcement.

FAMM further expressed its belief that "both versions of the song violate Jorja's legal rights and unjustly benefit from the work of all the songwriters with whom she works."

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

Suggesting that her supporters were possibly misled by Haven's original release, the label concluded: "Our industry cannot allow this to become the standard practice."

Producers Acknowledge Employing AI Tools

The team behind the song have publicly confirmed using AI during its creation.

Songwriter Harrison Walker explained that the original voice were in fact his own but were extensively manipulated using AI music software Suno, often called the "advanced tool for music".

Meanwhile, the second producer, Waypoint, identified as Jacob Donaghue, stated on social media that AI was used to "give our original vocal a female tone".

Donaghue and Walker maintain that they composed and produced the music themselves and have even shared evidence of their source production sessions.

"It shouldn't be secret that I used AI-powered vocal processing to convert exclusively my voice for 'I Run'," Walker said.

"Being a creator and producer, I enjoy experimenting with new tools, techniques and remaining on the cutting edge of what's happening," he continued.

"In order to set the facts clear, the people behind HAVEN are actual and people, and all we aim to do is make enjoyable music for other humans."

Legal Uncertainty and Broader Implications

Although their original version of 'I Run' was blocked from official charts, the new recording did break into the UK Top 40 last week.

FAMM has positioned the incident as a significant test case for the music industry's changing relationship with artificial intelligence.

The label argued it had "an obligation to voice concerns" and "encourage wider discussion", because AI is proliferating at an "rapid rate and substantially exceeding legal oversight".

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

Artists as 'Collateral Damage'

Smith endorsed her label's statement on her own social media profile.

The post warned that musicians and songwriters were becoming "collateral damage in the race by governments and corporations towards AI supremacy".

It also stated that the label would share any awarded songwriting credits with the writers behind Smith's music.

"If we are successful in establishing that AI assisted to write the lyrics and melody in 'I Run' and are granted a share of the song, we would seek to assign each of Jorja's co-writers with a corresponding share," it explained.

The Continuing Rise of Computer-Generated Music

The emergence of algorithmically created music has been a topic of both interest and anxiety for the music industry.

• In the summer, the group Velvet Sundown accumulated vast numbers of streams before disclosing they used AI to aid develop their musical style.
• Last month, an AI-generated "performer" known as Breaking Rust topped a US genre digital song sales chart, showing that audiences are not necessarily opposed to hearing computer-generated music.
• Suno was last year taken to court for copyright infringement by the industry's major largest record labels, though those cases have since been settled.

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

Yet, it remains uncertain how a large number of established musicians will consent to such applications of their work.

Recently, a collective of prominent musicians such as Sir Paul McCartney, Annie Lennox, Damon Albarn, and Kate Bush released a vinyl album containing silent songs or recordings of empty studios in opposition to proposed revisions to copyright law.

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