
What does AI band The Velvet Sundown's rise mean for the future of music?
Advertisement
In the space of just six weeks, the band has pumped out three albums containing 13 songs each and had close to 1.5 million monthly listeners on Spotify as of July 22.
But The Velvet Sundown – or rather, its makers – do not hide behind the fact that it has been relying on artificial intelligence to do so.
'Not quite human. Not quite machine. The Velvet Sundown lives somewhere in between,' it says on the band's social media accounts and its Spotify site.
It is said to be a band of four, but the members have not been seen in public so far. Images of the group have evidently been created by AI.
Advertisement
Music by The Velvet Sundown started making the rounds across streaming platforms in early June. Combining rock, country and folk elements, most of the songs are interchangeable, mellow and tame – as long as you ignore lines like 'March for peace, not for pride' in the group's most played song, 'Dust on the Wind'.
Hashtags

Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles


South China Morning Post
3 hours ago
- South China Morning Post
What the Coldplay ‘kiss cam' scandal says about privacy for us all today
When the 'kiss cam' at a Coldplay concert on July 16 landed on a couple who tried – but failed – to duck out of the spotlight, the internet immediately got to work. In hours, the clip was just about everywhere. Endless memes, parody videos and photos of the pair's shocked faces filled social media feeds. Online sleuths rushed to identify who was on camera. US tech company Astronomer eventually confirmed that its CEO and chief people officer were in fact the couple in the video – and announced the CEO's resignation that weekend. The incident's fallout has generated conversations about business ethics, corporate accountability and the repercussions that conflicts of interest among leadership can cause. But there are also broader implications at play in our increasingly online world: about the state of potentially being visible everywhere you go, or tracked through 'social media surveillance'. From doorbells to smartphones, cameras now film much of our lives. Photo: Shutterstock Experts say it is increasingly common for moments that may have been intended to be private, or at least reserved to a single physical venue, to make their way online and even go global today.


South China Morning Post
a day ago
- South China Morning Post
Hulk Hogan, wrestling legend, dead at 71
Hulk Hogan, the mustachioed, headscarf-wearing icon in the world of professional wrestling, has died at the age of 71, Florida police and WWE said on Thursday. In Clearwater, Florida, authorities responded to a call on Thursday morning about a cardiac arrest. Hogan was pronounced dead at a hospital, police said in a statement on social media. Hogan, whose real name was Terry Bollea, was perhaps the biggest star in WWE's long history. He was the main draw for the first WrestleMania in 1985 and was a fixture for years, facing everyone from Andre The Giant and Randy Savage to The Rock and even company chairman Vince McMahon. He won at least six WWE championships and was inducted into the WWE Hall of Fame in 2005. Hulk Hogan fires up the crowd between matches at WrestleMania 21 in Los Angeles in April 2005. Photo: AP Hogan was also a celebrity outside the wrestling world, appearing in numerous films and television shows, including a reality show about his life on VH1, Hogan Knows Best.


South China Morning Post
a day ago
- South China Morning Post
Labubu, soft power of a stealthy ‘ugly-cute' sort, takes on America
Alexandra Schmauch, who works at a property company in Dallas, Texas, was initially sceptical of the Labubu doll craze. As she watched the commotion build on TikTok and many of her friends became avid collectors, however, curiosity got the better of her. Advertisement Eventually, after several attempts, she managed to secure a couple of Labubus, relishing the 'blind box' surprise of not knowing which Labubu character was inside. 'A lot of the fun is how hard they are to get,' said Schmauch, aged 28. 'I was lucky enough to get two. It's kind of fun not knowing what you're going to get.' The global Labubu hysteria has sparked long queues, online mania, customer fist-fights and explosive revenue growth for the Chinese retailer Pop Mart, which had some US$423 million in global Labubu sales alone on overall revenue of US$1.8 billion last year. Priced in the United States at around US$30 apiece, rare varieties of the doll can resell for thousands of dollars; last month, an auction in Beijing saw a singular Labubu go for US$172,000. Advertisement For decades, China has manufactured most of the world's toys, including such past must-haves as Beanie Babies, Tamagotchi and Fidget Spinners. But this is among its first home-grown global megahits, with 40 per cent of Labubu's sales coming from outside China.