Alice Cooper has issued a dire warning about the future of rock music, claiming that artificial intelligence is now capable of creating fully formed “rock stars” that don’t actually exist – and can even release hit albums without a single human emotion behind them.
Appearing on SiriusXM’s Trunk Nation with Eddie Trunk, the 78-year-old shock rock icon said technology has advanced so far that a trustworthy, marketable artist can be created from the ground up.
He explained: “Okay, here’s the deal. I can make a rock star right now. I can make a Yungblud, a guy who’s really attractive, rock, tough, good looking. I can make a guy named – I don’t care – Starboy or something, and make him look great. He doesn’t really exist.”
The Poison hitmaker revealed how AI could be instructed to imitate famous voices and write entire albums without any human involvement.
He said: “I can say to the AI, ‘I want it to sound like Tom Petty and Freddie Mercury. And here’s the album. Write the songs.’ Well, now you have a rock star that doesn’t exist, and you have an album that doesn’t exist anywhere else but in this world. And what if it is sold? Who gets the money? “AI wrote the songs.”
He warned that the industry was heading towards a legal and creative minefield, saying: “It’s going to happen. You can see it happening, because the person who just suggested what it should be didn’t write the songs.”
He emphasizes that the real issue is not copyright – but the lack of lived experience.
Alice continued: “If I could have asked it to write a song about Eddie Trunk joining The Rolling Stones, he would have written a great song for you – except for one thing. The one thing it couldn’t do – it never fell in love. It never got heartbroken. It never got angry. It never got happy.”
He argued that AI-generated music will always lack the emotional core that defines great rock songwriting.
He said: “It only knows words… but it has no feelings. It has no heart, it has no feelings, it has no soul, and it dies right there.”
And until AI can replicate that human spark, Alice believes her creations will ring hollow.
He added, “You know it doesn’t come from any roots, any heart, any experience. When they get that, I think… I don’t know what’s going to happen with music.”
Meanwhile, Alice is preparing for her Devil on My Shoulder book tour, with special guest host Arthur Brown, radio favorite Claire Sturgess and renowned music journalist Billy Sloane joining the tour.
Visit alicecooper.com for more information.
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