Imagine there are no singers! Music bosses panic over new AI-generated John Lennon song to be released 40 years after Beatles star’s death

Sir Paul McCartney recently vowed to make “the last Beatles record,” complete with vocals by John Lennon.

Now it looks like he’s been beaten by a complete stranger – and the result is causing massive panic in the music industry.

Sir Paul explained how artificial intelligence technology had been used to extract Lennon’s voice from a 1978 demo so he could complete the song, which will be released later this year.

But he also stressed that “nothing is artificial or synthetic,” with AI simply cleaning up what was already there.

However, the same is certainly not true of a computer-generated video that recently appeared in which Lennon, more than 40 years after his death, sings an entirely new song.

Sir Paul explained how artificial intelligence technology had been used to extract Lennon’s voice from a 1978 demo so he could complete the song, which will be released later this year.

It’s been more than 50 years since all four members of The Beatles released music, with their emotional classic ‘The End’. Pictured from left to right: Paul McCartney, John Lennon, Ringo Starr and George Harrison

Images of him performing a song called Everybody But You have been shared on social media platforms and have won positive reviews from listeners.

Some even praise it as good enough to have been released by the Fab Four themselves.

Everybody But You was written earlier this year by an artist using the pseudonym Kid Klava, who confirmed that instead of singing it himself, he had used AI to create a performance by the Beatles star without permission from his estate .

He boasted on TikTok, “I realized I can get John to sing it to me!” And why not put Paul on backing vocals while I’m at it?’

Meanwhile, another post features images of soul legend Stevie Wonder performing one of Kid Klava’s songs.

The use of famous artists to perform songs written by modern unknowns has sparked widespread alarm at the top of the music industry, sparking fears about copyrights and about dead singers being used to make money for people who have no connection with them.

Label bosses even fear they could lose control of the output of some of their biggest acts. One executive said: ‘Using some of the greatest artists ever to artificially stage and promote songs is a nightmare for us.

“It threatens to undermine everything the music industry was created for.

‘But you also have to think about the relatives of people like John Lennon, because his legend status is used to make money for others. It seems completely wrong and open to massive abuse.”

Universal, the world’s largest record label, has advocated applying copyright to the data used for machine learning, such as the voice stems that train computers to create voice clones.

Sting has also criticized the use of AI to write new songs and music. Earlier this year, the ex-Police frontman said that ‘the building blocks of music belong to us, to people’.

Artificial intelligence is also at the root of the current Hollywood strikes.

Actors and writers alike are refusing to cooperate in protest at the possibility of film and television studios using AI technology to replace them.