AI beats human producer in J-pop song contest as fans choose machine-written single

Japanese girl band AKB48 has released an AI-generated single after fans chose it over a song written by renowned J-pop producer Yasushi Akimoto in a head-to-head competition. The AI victory highlights how machine learning tools trained on existing creative works can resonate with audiences, potentially reshaping how the music industry approaches songwriting and production.

How the competition worked: The songwriting battle took place on Nippon TV’s “Akimoto Yasushi vs AI Akimoto Yasushi: AKB48 New Song Production Contest,” where an AI version of Google’s Gemini was trained on Akimoto’s lyrics library and interview statements.

• The AI’s song “Omoide Scroll” (“Memory Scroll”), described as a techno-pop track about heartbreak in the smartphone era, won 14,225 votes out of 24,760 total.
• Akimoto’s human-written song “Cecil,” a retro-style piece about a girl’s admiration for another girl, received 10,535 votes.

What they’re saying: Both the human and AI versions of Akimoto offered contrasting perspectives on the results.

• “How am I supposed to react to this? It’s disappointing, I wrote it with all my effort,” Akimoto said after losing.
• The AI “Akimoto” was gracious in victory: “AI is good at deriving the ‘greatest common denominator’ from past data. Perhaps by losing, the real me was trying to show something new.”
• To which the human Akimoto responded jokingly: “Oh, be quiet.”

Fan reaction: Social media comments showed excitement about the AI-generated release, with many suggesting it captured something missing from recent human-written songs.

• “To be honest, this one seems like it will sell better. It feels like this one has something that recent Akimoto songs have been missing,” wrote one fan.
• AKB48 posted on X: “Thank you for watching the Nippon TV special program ‘Yasushi Akimoto × AI: Yasushi Akimoto vs. AKB48 New Song Showdown.’ The winner was surprisingly AI Yasushi Akimoto.”

About AKB48: The world’s largest pop group maintains over 120 members split into rotating performance teams, with members ranging from teens to mid-20s who “graduate” and are replaced by trainees.

• The group serves as commercial ambassadors for products ranging from chocolate to cell phones, and has even appeared in Japanese military recruitment videos and government bond promotions.
• AKB48 has spawned international sister groups including Shanghai’s SNH48, Jakarta’s JKT48, and Manila’s MNL48, along with manga series and video games.