I'm Flora Lichtenen, and you're listening to Science Friday.

In recent months, AI music seems to have exited the realm of novelty act and moved into the world of having living, breathing, fans.

But what's the impact going to be? Science Friday producer and musician D. Peter Schmidt is here to investigate.

Hey, Dee.

Hey, Flora.

AI music got on my radar last year because I kept getting these videos on my algorithm.

The inventor of the road roller was a genius.

He made a 20-ton machine creates 60 tons of force.

The secret is that the roller drum isn't a solid piece of metal.

The magic comes describing how various pieces of heavy machinery work.

Pretty mainstream stuff.

But for the first time, last year, some AI-generated songs actually got onto the charts,

like this one from Zanayamone.

So lift your hands up and soften your heart.

Let go.

And some pretty big names in the music industry

have gotten pretty vocal about using it too, like Timbaland.

It's like an assistant when I do a beat

and I'm like, yo, how would you take these drums and

rearrange it this way? And I'm like, oh, I would have never heard it that way. So what's going

on right now at AI music companies like Suno? And is this just another tech upgrade to the music

making process or is it something else? I wanted to call up one of the journalists I follow on

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