Just one day after sending several tweets about sharing royalties with artists who would use her voice in AI-generated songs, Grimes has left her record label.
The 35-year-old singer (born Claire Elise Boucher) split with Columbia Records after signing to the label in early March 2021 via Billboard.
While no reason for the split was given, it was confirmed by the singer’s longtime manager, Daouda Leonard.
It’s unclear how this will affect the status of her long-awaited sixth album titled Book 1, which has no release date yet.
The artist – who made headlines for changing her daughter’s name to Elon Musk – has yet to speak publicly about leaving her label, though she did hint at it in her first tweet about AI songs on Sunday.
No label: Just one day after sending several tweets about sharing royalties with artists who would use her voice in AI-generated songs, Grimes left her record label
Grimes first started the conversation about AI songs on Sunday by tweeting an image of a Seattle Times article about AI songs with a message to AI artists, which also hinted at her split from Columbia.
“I share 50% royalties on every successful AI-generated song that uses my voice. Same deal as I would with any artist I work with,” Grimes said.
‘Feel free to use my voice without penalty. I have no label and no legal ties,” she added, referring to her split from Columbia.
Soon after, she tweeted, “I think it’s cool to be fused with a machine and I like the idea of open sourcing all art and killing copyright.”
“We are making a program that should simulate my voice well, but we can also upload stems and samples so that people can train their own voice,” she added in another tweet.
She then tweeted a link to it on Monday eleven techadding: “Talk to my team: If you register music with us, we can collect and pay royalties directly to anyone using AI Grimes vocals using smart contracts!?”
‘The future is now! this is so cool. Working on a way to record vocals and easily access vocals,” she added above the Elf Tech link.
She also added another much longer tweet with some stipulations for this new alleged arrangement.
Tweet: Grimes first started the conversation about AI songs on Sunday by tweeting an image from a Seattle Times article about AI songs with a message to AI artists, which also hinted at her split from Columbia
Fused: She tweeted shortly after, “I think it’s cool to be fused with a machine and I love the idea of open sourcing all the art and killing copyright”
Program: “We are making a program that should simulate my voice well, but we can also upload stems and samples so that people can train their own voice,” she added in another tweet
Team: She then tweeted a link to Elf Tech on Monday, adding, “Talk to my team: If you register music with us, we can collect royalties and pay them directly to anyone using AI Grimes vocals using smart contracts !?’
“Okay, I hate this part, but we are ONLY allowed to do copyright takedowns for highly toxic lyrics with the voice of grimes,” she began.
She then tweeted a link to it on Monday eleven techadding: “Talk to my team: If you register music with us, we can collect and pay royalties directly to anyone using AI Grimes vocals using smart contracts!?”
She then tweeted, “Okay hate this part but we are ONLY allowed to do copyright takedowns for highly toxic grimes voiced lyrics.”
“You sure would have to push it for me to take something down but I think plz isn’t *the worst*. as in, try not to leave the current Overton window of lyrical content related to sex/violence,” she added.
She clarified, “Like no baby murder songs plz. I think I’m Streisand doing this right now, but I don’t want to issue a removal and be a hypocrite later.”
That’s the only rule. Rly doesn’t like to follow a rule but doesn’t want to be responsible for a Nazi anthem unless it’s somehow in jest a la producers I guess,” she said.
The singer said she would prefer to “avoid political stuff, but if it’s a little meme with your friends, we probably won’t penalize that.”
“Probably only if smthn is viral and anti-abortion or something like that. They don’t like adding rules, so my apologies, but this is all,’ she concluded.
Grimes released her first five albums on indie labels, with 2010’s Geidi Primes and Halifaxa on Arbutus Records and 2012’s Visions, 2015’s Art Angels, and 2020’s Miss Anthropocene.
Hate: “Okay hate this part but we ONLY get to do copyright takedowns for very toxic grimes voiced lyrics,” she began