AI-generated country singer tops Billboard charts for first time

An entirely AI-generated country singer by the name of ‘Breaking Rust’ just topped a Billboard chart for the very first time.

Just last week, Billboard revealed at least one musician created by Artificial Intelligence (AI) is appearing in the charts with each passing week. Now, an AI-generated artist has topped one particular chart.

The top song on this week’s Billboard Country Digital Song Sales chart is a track called ‘Walk My Walk’, and it comes from an artist called Breaking Rust. However, none of it is real, as WhiskeyRiff first reported.

There are no physical instruments involved, and no one stood in front of a microphone to record the vocals. Every part of it, from the guitar riffs to the lyrics, it’s all been generated by AI. As described, it’s “music for the fighters and the dreamers.”

AI country singer tops Billboard charts with Walk My Walk

Breaking Rust already boasts over 2.1 million monthly listeners on Spotify, despite only having recently debuted on the platform. Not to mention, they have over 36,000 followers on Instagram, despite there being no original content. The vast majority of engagement appears to come from fellow bots, given the sheer emoji spam.

The chart Walk My Walk topped is worth taking with a pinch of salt, however, as it spotlights digital song sales in the country genre. After all, how many still pay for individual songs, as opposed to simply streaming their music? That said, the chart-topping song in question already has over 3 million streams on Spotify alone.

Aubierre Rivaldo Taylor is the name listed on the Spotify account, seemingly the human behind the AI prompts.

With their generative work, they’ve created timeless country lyrics like: “I was born this way. Been loud too long.” Not to mention, “Laugh at the scars, they’re proof I’m alive.”

This all follows close behind the case of Xania Monet, another AI-generated musician who recently ‘aspired’ to hit the top of the charts in the R&B genre.