As artificial intelligence becomes an increasingly powerful tool, record labels and artists in the Korean pop music industry have begun exploring the possibilities for its use in their creative work. Jessie Chen has the story.
This story originally aired as part of our A.I. Special Broadcast.
[ON- BTS]
YOU MIGHT RECOGNIZE THIS VOICE AS JUNGKOOK FROM BTS …
[BLACKPINK song]
AND THIS ONE AS JENNIE FROM BLACKPINK …
[My World- Aespa]
BUT WHO SANG THIS LINE IN ONE OF AESPA’S NEWEST SONGS?
[MAVE: Soompi interview]
AND WHOSE VOICES DO THESE BELONG TO?
[Aespa- My World]
IN THE WORLD OF KOREAN POP MUSIC, OR K-POP, THE EVER-GROWING NEED TO INNOVATE, EXPERIMENT, AND EXPAND GENRES HAS LED TO SOME UNCANNY CREATIONS IN THE PAST FEW YEARS.
[JingXi Yap] I think a lot of the nature of why Kpop is what it is, is because they try to set themselves apart. It’s like a separate genre from like, normal pop music.
THAT’S SCHOOL OF COMM FIRST-YEAR, JINGXI YAP. SHE SAYS SOME OF THE BIGGEST PLAYERS IN THE KOREAN MUSIC INDUSTRY HAVE TURNED TO TECHNOLOGY TO CREATE THEIR NEWEST HITS.
[JY] And I also think it has a lot to do with like, the people who have the most money in Kpop seeing value in investing in AI.
JINGXI ALSO ALLUDES TO THE CREATIVE VISION OF THE FOUNDER OF SM, A HUGELY SUCCESSFUL SOUTH KOREAN MULTINATIONAL ENTERTAINMENT AGENCY AND RECORD LABEL.
[JY] Specifically, this has to do with Lee Sooman and SM Entertainment and him finding value in his vision for AI like AI being the future of the world and therefore AI should be the future of music for his idols.
IN 2020, SM INTRODUCED ITS GIRL GROUP AESPA, COMPOSED OF FOUR MEMBERS: KARINA, WINTER, GISELLE, AND NING NING, AND FOUR OF THEIR VIRTUAL COUNTERPARTS CALLED AES.
[Next Level- Aespa]
[Elizabeth Wang] Like, originally, I was just like, confused because it was just like their AI persona version of them. They felt like and I was like, oh, it’s better not like really be a thing. And then it ended up not really being a thing. So I was like, okay, whatever.
THAT’S WEINBERG FIRST-YEAR ELIZABETH WANG, WHO THINKS THAT AESPA’S USE OF AI IS MAINLY A MARKETING TACTIC.
HER SENTIMENT IS ALSO ECHOED BY SCHOOL OF COMM FIRST-YEAR PATRICK BAN, WHO ATTRIBUTES AESPA’S VIRTUAL AVATAR TO BEING PART OF THEIR “CONCEPT” OR THE GENERAL THEME AND IMAGE THAT A K-POP GROUP REPRESENTS.
[Patrick Ban] I think it’s literally just a concept. I don’t think it’s any more than that. And because like their most recent comeback song, Spicy, has like, nothing to do with their concept or their previous concept or didn’t feature any of their like, AI selves. So I think it’s literally just for the concept.
[EW] The only thing I didn’t like about the concept is that they would have random keywords like Kwangya randomly in the song.
KWANGYA IS THE UNIVERSE THAT AESPA CANONICALLY EXISTS IN.
[EW] I was like, that makes no sense in the lyrics why do you need it? it’s nothing more than just a way for them to keep a storyline.
[Next Level- Aespa]
ALTHOUGH AI HAS BECOME AN INCREASINGLY POPULAR TOOL LATELY, ITS HISTORY IN THE K-POP INDUSTRY CAN BE TRACED BACK AS FAR AS 2018 WITH K/DA, THE VIRTUAL GIRL GROUP COMPOSED OF FOUR THEMED VERSIONS OF CHARACTERS FROM THE VIDEO GAME LEAGUE OF LEGENDS.
[Carolyne Geng] I remember being really impressed well, because at the time they had these virtual avatars, but I also noticed that the people voicing those avatars were members of an actual K-pop group. But at that point, it was mainly like a virtual concept to like market these in-game characters.
THAT’S CAROLYNE GENG, A THIRD-YEAR IN WEINBERG AND A WNUR DJ WHO DRAWS HEAVILY FROM K-POP SOUNDS.
[CG] But I think since then, there have been truly AI-generated groups by tech companies.
NOTABLY, THE COMPANY METAVERSE ENTERTAINMENT DEBUTED A FULLY VIRTUAL FOUR-MEMBER GIRL GROUP THIS YEAR NAMED MAVE:
[Pandora- MAVE:]
[CG] It was this massive project by this big corporation in Korea and they wanted to kind of market it as a group that could be mass appealing and cater to people’s very specific ideas of what an attractive K-pop star could look like.
CAROLYNE SPEAKS TO THE MALLEABLE QUALITY OF AI, WHICH ALLOWS FOR HIGH CUSTOMIZATION WHEN CREATING IDOL GROUPS. HOWEVER, MCCORMICK FIRST-YEAR LYNNA DENG IS A BIT WARY OF ITS IMPLICATIONS.
[Lynna Deng] I feel kind of conflicted. It’s kind of freaky to be able to have companies fully shape what we think people ought to look like and the talents they ought to have because when you have an AI, all of that is buildable by, like the company’s own opinion.
JINGXI ALSO ECHOES LYNNA’S SENTIMENTS.
[JY] The way that AI idols are pretty much the perfect idol sometimes doesn’t really sit right for you. Because you can make an idol perfectly fit any single beauty standard that you want them to
AND PATRICK IS JUST GENERALLY OPPOSED TO THE IDEA.
[PB] It’s a big no for me, but like, okay, the song is good.
[Pandora- MAVE:]
CAROLYNE ALSO SPEAKS TO SOME OF THE REASONS WHY SOME COMPANIES MAY FIND AI TO BE A PROFITABLE TOOL IN CREATING K-POP GROUPS.
[CG] The thing is, it costs a lot less to like “train” an AI model instead of like training a human.
HERE, CAROLYNE REFERENCES THE TRAINEE SYSTEM, A GRUELING PROCESS THAT USUALLY INVOLVES INTENSIVELY TAKING VOCAL, DANCE, AND OCCASIONALLY LANGUAGE LESSONS, WHICH ALL K-POP IDOLS HAVE TO ENDURE IN ORDER TO SUCCESSFULLY DEBUT IN A GROUP.
[JY] The whole reason you have the trainee system in place is to make these idols feel ready to go out into the world and to sing and to dance and to be held to that high standard. So when you are able to incorporate AI like solely as your tactic I don’t think the trainee system works anymore.
JINGXI ALSO SPEAKS TO HOW THE USE OF AI IN CREATING K-POP GROUPS CAN PERPETUATE EXISTING TOXIC STANDARDS IN THE INDUSTRY.
[JY] I think the reason why companies see so much value in AI is because of how much value the industry itself puts on being young and being able to work non-stop. And so having AI idols pretty much means that your idols will always be young because they’re never going to age and that you’re allowed to relentlessly work them. And at the end of the day, these AI idols will make you the most money with the least amount of investment or the least slight chance of failing.
CAROLYNE ALSO SPEAKS TO THE BROADER CONSEQUENCES THAT THIS TECHNOLOGY COULD BRING TO THE INDUSTRY.
[CG] I think in a lot of ways, the AI trends in Kpop, and the creation of AI Kpop groups are very similar to other AI trends when we look at chat GPT or we look at new language processing models. The Metaverse, things like that. I think a lot of it stemmed from really good intent or pretty decent intentions. Like the pandemic shut everything down. So tapping a virtual presence was super important. The problem now is again, like, how this is going into labor laws. How does this go into AI and copyright laws? There are just so many, I think that’s a gray area that definitely exists and also calls into question, how “authentic” can they be. How how much of Kpop is the product rather than the people necessarily involved in the process?
IN DISCUSSING THE POSSIBILITY OF AI REP LACING ITS HUMAN COUNTERPARTS IN THE K-POP INDUSTRY, LYNNA DOESN’T THINK IT’S CURRENTLY LIKELY TO HAPPEN ANYTIME SOON.
[LD] I think that with pure, like an actual robot slash ChatGPT written idol, people wouldn’t be able to get over that uncanny valley feeling. Even MAVE:’s current success can’t really compare to human idols.
CAROLYNE SAYS THAT A BIG REASON BEHIND K-POP’S POPULARITY IS ITS GENUINE SIDE.
[CG] I think a huge part of fandom, especially in Kpop, is this idea of authenticity and being able to kind of interact between the artist and the fan. I think a lot of fans do appreciate hearing these kinds of like, you know, little mess-ups from idols or seeing little jokes that they crack over like V Lives.
A KOREAN LIVE-STREAMING PLATFORM.
[CG] I don’t think AI will ever kind of get to that level where it will start creating these types of little mistakes and glitches to create authenticity.
JINGXI ALSO SHARES THIS OPINION.
[JY] When you ask a lot of fans what’s your favorite thing about this idol? It also comes with I love their personality. I think they are an incredibly nice person, and I feel like I can, relate to them. And then also has this aspect of para socialism, which I think that AI idols can’t do as well because they aren’t human.
[My World- Aespa]
FOR WNUR NEWS, I’M JESSIE CHEN.
