How much of a threat to musicians is AI? It’s been the subject of intense debate in the last year or more, and guitarist Zakk Wylde reckons there’s actually not that much to be worried about.
In a recent Q&A session, the Black Label Society frontman and former Ozzy Osbourne guitarist called AI a “fun” tool, but dispelled fears that it could actually replace human artists. “You can’t replace what’s coming out of Ozzy’s mind,” he said.
And now, Wylde has doubled down on his assertion that AI isn’t as scary as some make it out to be, telling Qobuz [via Blabbermouth]: “To me, it’s no big deal.”
Specifically talking about AI music generators which are trained on large datasets to come up with music based on simple user prompts, Wylde says: “Whoever the artist is that you love, whether it’s Led Zeppelin or Black Sabbath, you’ll never be able to replace what’s gonna come out of Tony [Iommi’s] riffs, what Geezer [Butler] is gonna write lyrically, what Bill [Ward] is gonna play, what melodies Ozzy’s gonna sing, because they’re creating it.”
He continues: “But I get it. I mean, if AI listens to all of Ozzy’s melodies and gets a feel for what Ozzy’s style is, and then hears Tony’s riffs and then it could hear the tendencies Bill plays, certain fills he does, and the way Geezer plays bass, and it listens to the lyrics… and it comes up with something, it’d be no different than a songwriter trying to come up with something that Black Sabbath would write.”
He says the same principle applies to an AI algorithm trying to replicate the music of Jimi Hendrix, for example.
“Everyone’s terrified of [AI],” Wylde goes on. “I just think you can’t take away what’s in the mind of Jimi Hendrix… You can try and emulate it.
“All I look at it is the computer is just giving a compliment to the sound of whatever band that they’re trying to [emulate], like the Eagles or something, [and write a song like Desperado or Hotel California].
“It doesn’t bother me, because I’m still gonna buy the record from the Eagles.
Zakk Wylde’s Black Label Society are currently on tour in the US. Check out the band’s website for tickets and more details.
Sam is the Associate News Editor for Guitar.com and MusicTech. Thoroughly immersed in music culture for the majority of his life, Sam has played guitar for 20 years, studied music technology and production at university, and also written for the likes of Guitar World, Total Guitar, Metal Hammer and MusicRadar.