A new Drake and Weeknd song is going viral, except it’s made by AI

What’s the fuss surrounding the new Drake x The Weeknd song?

On April 14, a mysterious artist that goes by the name “Ghostwriter” posted on his social media channels a track called “Heart on My Sleeve” featuring the vocals of Drake and The Weeknd. The song has both Canadian artists singing and rapping about Selena Gomez.

If you weren’t clued in already, there’s a good chance you’d take the song to be the real deal – it’s that realistic – except it’s not, and is yet another product of artificial intelligence. The two-minute fake tune has since been widely shared on social media with people in awe of how natural it sounds.

https://twitter.com/mckaywrigley/status/1647600838624399370?s=20

“I came in with my ex like Selena to flex, bumpin’ Justin Bieber the fever ain’t left me. She know all she need, I need her she blessed giving her my best. I got my heart on my sleeve with a knife in my back what’s with that? Aye 21, I love him that my brother that’s my slatt,” raps the clone Drake in the song. He’s followed by The Weeknd who also sings about Selena, whom he dated from 2015 to 2017.

The AI-generated song has even been uploaded to Spotify where it’s been streamed over 2,50,000 times in just 3 days.

Not the first AI-generated song to go viral

This isn’t the first AI-generated track to go viral because of how realistic it sounds, though.

In early February, Eminem’s vocals made a guest appearance at a show thanks to David Guetta, who shared a video of him singing in Eminem’s voice. The video features Guetta hyping up a massive crowd while mimicking Eminem’s voice using AI. “This is the future rave sound, I’m getting awesome and underground,” he sang.

Let me introduce you to… Emin-AI-em 👀 pic.twitter.com/48prbMIBtv

— David Guetta (@davidguetta) February 3, 2023

The move attracted criticism almost immediately and Guetta clarified in a reply to the original tweet that he’ll “obviously” not release the track commercially.

Other instances include Ariana Grande singing Rihanna’s ‘Diamonds’ and even Drake giving K-Pop a shot.

What tools are used to create songs like these?

Ghostwriter did not reveal how they created “Heart on My Sleeve,” so the specific tool behind the track is unknown. However, it’s likely that they used a combination of different tools to arrive at the track.

Digging around we found the best way to create something similar is by first using Jarvis to generate rap song lyrics and then pasting those lyrics into Uberduck.ai to convert them into an actual vocals-only song. The music will have to be produced using other means, though.

The legal implications of AI-generated songs

The legal implications of AI-generated rap that mimick real artists are not clear yet, so it appears Ghostwriter is exploiting a copyright grey area. While parody is allowed under copyright law, impersonation is strictly illegal, especially if it results in a loss of commercial earnings.

But Ghostwriter isn’t claiming to be Drake or The Weeknd, so it’s difficult to ascertain if impersonation laws still apply in this case. Many do believe, though, that a lawsuit against the creator is imminent especially since the track is now up on Spotify.