Japanese girl band AKB48 releases AI-generated single after fans preferred it to song written by human

Members of AKB48 are pictured on stage in 2021. (Chen Lihong/VCG/Getty Images via CNN Newsource)

Top Japanese girl band AKB48 have released a single created using AI, after it proved more popular with fans than a rival song written by famed J-pop producer Yasushi Akimoto.

As part of a songwriting competition on a Nippon TV program called “Akimoto Yasushi vs AI Akimoto Yasushi: AKB48 New Song Production Contest,” the AI – a version of Google’s Gemini – was trained on Akimoto’s library of lyrics and his public statements from interviews to develop its own creative voice.

The AI’s creation, “Omoide Scroll / “Memory Scroll,” described in Japanese media as a techno-pop track about heartbreak in the smartphone era, won 14,225 votes out of a total 24,760, according to the organizers.

Akimoto’s own song, titled “Cecil,” described as a retro-style piece where a girl sings about her admiration for another girl, received 10,535 votes.

Following news of the result, Akimoto said: “How am I supposed to react to this? It’s disappointing, I wrote it with all my effort.”

However, he had previously suggested that he would be open to being inspired by the AI.

“If the AI can write a better song, that would make me happy. I want to see it and think, ‘I never thought of that! It’ll help us decide which direction the next AKB ought to head in,” he said before the result of the vote was announced.

And 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,” it said.

To which the human Akimoto responded jokingly: “Oh, be quiet.”

AKB48 have remained fairly neutral in the clash of the Akimotos, but the band did post on its official X account: “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.”

As for the band’s fans, a majority of social media comments expressed excitement about the release of the AI-generated song.

“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.

AKB48 is the world’s largest pop group, with more than 120 members.

They are in their teens to mid-20s, and are split into teams to rotate performances. When they “graduate,” they are replaced by trainees.

The young women are commercial darlings, selling everything from chocolate to cell phones and even appearing in videos recruiting for the Japanese military and promoting government bonds.

They have also spawned their own manga series, video games and several sister groups, like Shanghai’s SNH48, Jakarta’s JKT48 and Manila’s MNL48.

By Jack Guy and Riku Inoue, CNN