AI Country Artists Like “Terry & The Dustriders” Are Racking Up Millions Of Streams With Fake Cover Albums On Spotify

Anybody listened to that new Terry and the Dustriders album lately? Now, chances are you have no idea who that is. But they've managed to rack up millions of streams on Spotify with their album of country cover songs, featuring their versions of songs like "Wagon Wheel" from Darius Rucker and Carrie Underwood's "Before He Cheats." And their cover of Lady A's "Need You Now" has more than 4 million streams since being released on their EP Dreamin' of the Heartland last year. They're also not real. Terry and the Dustriders are just one of many seemingly-AI "artists" posting music to Spotify and landing themselves on playlists that allow them to rack up major streaming numbers. The AI tracks are clearly meant to resemble the originals, because the guys singing Dan + Shay's "10,000 Hours" sound nothing like the singer for "Wagon Wheel." And then they must have found a female lead singer to cover Carrie Underwood's track. How convenient. But when you look at their bio, the group claims to be "a duo from a small coal mining town in West Virginia." (They also claim that the nearest Walmart is 75 miles away, and as somebody who is ACTUALLY from a small coal mining town in southern West Virginia, I can guarantee that there's nowhere in the state where the nearest Walmart is 75 miles away). But Terry and the Dustriders are far from the only AI country artist who's releasing music on Spotify and using it to make real money through fake covers that are added to playlists. Take a look at some of these other artists, like "Waterfront Wranglers," "Highway Outlaws," and "Saltwater Saddles." https://twitter.com/tevordoley22/status/1813999756399788361 The albums aren't just on Spotify, they're also available on Apple Music and Amazon. And they're not limited to just country music either - there are AI artists in every genre popping up on streaming services. It's hard to track down exactly who's behind these, because the labels are typically something generic like "T&D Music" in the case of Terry and the Dustriders. There are no trademarks or copyrights registered for these artists, which you'd think any artist with millions of streams would be quick to do. They have no social media or online presence outside of their music. And they're not registered with any performing rights organization like ASCAP or BMI - because they have no songs they've written themselves. But the problem arises because somebody is getting paid decent money for these AI songs, while taking money and streams away from actual artists. The model for paying artists for streams is calculated, but a quick and dirty rundown is that Spotify pools all the money they make, keeps 30% of it, and distributes the other 70% to artists. The 70% is split up among artists based on the number of streams that an artist has. But obviously, when you throw in AI artists, that means that the pool available to actual artists is smaller because some percentage of that 70% is going to AI creators and not artists releasing their own music. Obviously the entire world is struggling to keep up with advancements in AI, but it's clear that if the music industry and streaming platforms allow this to continue unchecked, these AI creators are going to continue to create fake artists to eat up a bigger and bigger chunk of the streaming revenues. And sure, even a few million streams is just a tiny drop in the bucket of the total streams on Spotify or Apple Music. But it's a drop that could be going to real artists and not some unknown entity sitting behind a computer and creating covers of already-popular songs.