“Is This What We Want?” 1,000 Artists Release Silent Album in Protest Against AI-Powered Music Theft

The UK is set to change its copyright law to attract more AI companies to the country. The updated law will allow AI models to be trained on content from the internet without permission from copyright holders or payment, unless creators “opt out” of it in advance. In protest, a group of 1,000 musicians released a “silent” album, “Is This What We Want?”, containing only recordings from empty studios and concert halls.

Image source: Pixabay

The album “Is This What We Want?”, which can only be described as a “cry from the heart”, contains tracks by Kate Bush, Imogen Heap, and contemporary classical composers Max Richter and Thomas Hewitt Jones. They were co-authored by Annie Lennox, Damon Albarn, Billy Ocean, The Clash, Pet Shop Boys, Mystery Jets, Yusuf, Cat Stevens, Riz Ahmed, Tori Amos, Hans Zimmer and other composers and performers.

But this is not a joint performance by the artists, like the world-famous composition “We are the world.” The new album does not contain any music as such. Instead, the artists have collected recordings from empty studios and concert halls – a symbolic representation of what the planned changes to copyright law will lead to. The titles of the 12 tracks included on the album form the sentence “The British government must not legalize music theft to benefit AI companies.”

Image source: Spotify

«”You can hear my cats running around,” Hewitt Jones described his contribution to the album. “I have two cats in the studio that keep me from working all day long.”

The project’s founder, Ed Newton-Rex, is leading a major campaign against unlicensed AI training. His petition has been signed by more than 47,000 writers, artists, actors and other creatives, with nearly 10,000 joining the protests in the past five weeks, following the UK government’s announcement of a major overhaul of its AI and copyright strategy.

The album’s release comes just ahead of planned changes to UK copyright law that will require artists who don’t want their work used to train AI to “opt out” of the prospect in advance. This effectively creates a lose-lose situation for musicians, as there is no method of opting out in advance or clear way to track what material has been used to train AI. “We know that opt-out schemes are simply not accepted,” says Newton-Rex.

«“We’ve been told for decades that we should share our work online because it’s good for distribution. But now AI companies and, incredibly, governments are turning around and saying, ‘Well, you’re putting it online for free…’” says Newton-Rex. “So now artists are just stopping creating and sharing their work.” The only solution, artists say, is to release their work in other markets where it will be better protected, such as Switzerland.

The album, “Is This What We Want?” is just one form of protest against the current situation with copyright in AI training. The organizers said that the album will be widely posted on music platforms today, and any donations or proceeds from its sale will go to the charity Help Musicians.