Jason Isbell Leads Class Action Suit Against Suno
Jason Isbell (Christy Bush)
Americana paragon Jason Isbell is leading a group of musicians into the latest frontier of the music industry’s increasingly complicated battle with AI.
The Wall Street Journal reports that the Grammy-winning singer-songwriter has filed a proposed class-action lawsuit against Suno, alleging that the AI platform’s technology allows users to generate songs that imitate artists simply by entering their names as prompts.
Filed Sept. 1 in U.S. District Court in Boston, the suit argues that Suno user activity goes beyond copyright infringement to the use of an artist’s name, likeness and musical identity without permission or compensation. Isbell is joined in the action by Camper Van Beethoven/Cracker frontman David Lowery, blues musician Guy Forsyth and saxophonist Eduardo Calle. “Jason Isbell’s musical identity does not cease to be his property merely because sophisticated technology is involved,” the lawsuit states.
Suno, valued at $5.4b in its latest funding round, says it blocks artist names from being used as prompts and that names weren’t used in training metadata. CEO Mikey Shulman wrote in an August blog post that “AI should help people create something new, not imitate someone else’s work.”
The plaintiffs, however, contend that those safeguards are easily bypassed. The lawsuit cites an example in which entering “jason isbell” allegedly generated a track called “Paper Bell,” described by Suno as “contemporary Americana singer-songwriter” with fingerpicked acoustic guitar and an intimate, narrative verse. The suit claims the resulting song mimicked Isbell’s vocals and country twang and alleges that users can evade Suno’s restrictions by, among other methods, spacing out the letters of an artist’s name.
At the heart of the case is what plaintiffs describe as Suno’s ability to create a “distillation” of the characteristics that allow a listener to recognize an artist—essentially reproducing the qualities that make someone sound like Jason Isbell without using a specific copyrighted recording.
Isbell and his fellow plaintiffs are seeking an order barring Suno from using their identities, as well as unspecified damages.
Universal Music Group, Sony Music Group and Warner Music Group have all pursued litigation involving AI platforms. Warner settled its claims against Suno last year after Suno agreed to pursue licensed AI products, with artists and songwriters expected to have the ability to opt in; that product has yet to be launched.
Warner and Universal have reached licensing agreements with Udio, whereas Sony has pending lawsuits against both Suno and Udio, and Universal’s case against Suno is pending.
Spotify, for its part, is developing an AI remixing tool based on licensed music that would keep the resulting creations on its platform.