The "robot rapper" dropped its debut track on a big label this week, a
joint effort with Gunna.
FN Meka, an artificial intelligence-powered "robot rapper" with over 10
million followers on TikTok and more than a billion views, has signed a deal
with Capitol Records.
Last week, Music Business Worldwide announced the new deal on the same day
FN Meka released his debut track for the label, "Florida Water," which also
includes (real-life) rapper Gunna and gaming streamer Clix. Turbo, whose
previous work includes tracks with Travis Scott, Young Thug, and Lil Baby,
produced it.
"Tesla, Gucci, Cybertruck / I trash that shit, don't give a fuck," FN sings
in one of the song's verses. Although a genuine human performs the voice,
the words appear to have been created by AI, according to the project's
developers. Listen to this:
Factory New, a "virtual" record company that was the first to "sign" FN,
developed FN Meka. Anthony Martini, the co-founder of the business,
described the operation to MBW last year and said that they had developed AI
technology that analyzes well-known songs from particular genres. Based on
that, he claimed, the system provides recommendations for the "lyrical
substance, chords, melody [and] pace" of new songs.
Martini said that the business later merged these components to create a
song. Currently, a human voice provides the singing, but researchers are
aiming to develop software that will allow computers to create and deliver
their own lyrics — and possibly work along with humans as "co-writers" — in
the future. It's unclear who the human voice singing, for example, in the
song "Florida Water" above belongs to.
The junction of music, technology, and gaming culture is where FN Meka
"meets," according to Ryan Ruden, Executive Vice President of Experiential
Marketing & Business Development at Capitol Music Group.
