The independent source for AI music news and tools.

Lorde publicly torches Spotify's AI 'About the Song' feature

• Lorde called out Spotify's AI About the Song feature in an Instagram Story on July 16, 2026, after it published incorrect context about one of her songs
• She asked Spotify to at least let artists opt out, saying AI-generated meaning at the source limits free interpretation
• Spotify confirmed the inaccurate text about Lorde's song has been removed, but the feature stays live in beta

Suno fights to keep its Warner licensing deal secret in the UMG and Sony lawsuit

• Suno filed a 20-page response on July 16, 2026 opposing Universal Music and Sony Music's renewed push to obtain its Warner Music licensing contract
• Suno argues handing over the deal would threaten to chill future settlements across AI copyright litigation
• Magistrate Judge Paul Levenson already denied the labels' request in April, and a July 9 hearing failed to resolve the dispute

Spotify launches Talk to Spotify, a ChatGPT-style assistant, in beta

• Spotify launched Talk to Spotify in beta on July 14, 2026 for Premium subscribers on iOS and Android in the US, Ireland, and Sweden
• The assistant takes typed or spoken prompts to build playlists, queue tracks, save songs, and answer questions about what's playing
• Talk to Spotify draws on each listener's playlists, favorite artists, and listening history to personalize responses

Laylo's UGC Agent auto-collects fan clips from Instagram Stories

• Laylo launched the UGC Agent on July 14, 2026, an AI agent monitoring an artist's Instagram Story tags for fan clips worth keeping
• The agent DMs the fan for the original file and reuse permission before the Story expires after 24 hours
• One band sent over 250 Instagram DMs in a weekend through the agent and collected hundreds of fan videos with permission

Udio signs a DRM deal with BuyDRM ahead of its licensed platform launch

• Udio has signed a deal with Austin-based BuyDRM to protect its AI music streams with the KeyOS MultiKey service, announced July 14, 2026
• The agreement gives Udio multi-DRM coverage across Google Widevine, Apple FairPlay, and Microsoft PlayReady
• KeyOS MultiKey includes a license release tool built to revoke playback licenses for songs a user has already downloaded

The AI Music Briefing #11: Suno is building a major label's front office while fighting like a defendant

The AI Music Briefing for July 13–19, 2026: Suno's 4-front week, LANDR's $1M AI advance fund, and a clone act collecting 94% of a real band's royalties.

Suno hack exposes source code showing it scraped YouTube Music, Deezer, and Genius

• A hacker breached Suno and gave 404 Media source code and data from the AI music generator's training libraries, reported on July 15, 2026.
• The leaked code shows Suno scraped 113,879 hours of YouTube Music, 17,615 hours of Genius, and 12,287 hours of Deezer, plus Pond5, Jamendo, Freesound, and podcast RSS feeds.
• The hacker also accessed data on hundreds of thousands of Suno customers, including emails, phone numbers, and Stripe payment details.