AI-generated artists may also play a task on this. A notable instance is the Okay-pop woman band aespa, fashioned by South Korean firm SM Leisure in 2020. The band consists of actual singers performing beneath the stage names Karina, Giselle, Winter and Ningning, who’ve additionally been given digital alter egos.[1] On the first World Cultural Business Discussion board (WCIF), which needed to be held on-line attributable to COVID-19, SM Leisure Chairman Soo-Man Lee defined the idea behind aespa. The avatars – also referred to as æ avatars – usually are not merely representations of the human musicians, however have impartial identities that work together within the digital world: “There’s a new idea group with a groundbreaking identification that we are able to work with. The members of the ‘actual world’ and the members of the ‘digital world’ have AI brains as totally different creatures, to allow them to speak to one another, give tides, make pals, and every world. We’re planning to point out off a totally new idea of storytelling that we couldn’t meet earlier than, corresponding to going backwards and forwards between the worlds by dividing the data.”[2]

After the 4 artists had been launched on SM Leisure’s social media channels between 27 and 30 October 2020,[3] their first single, “Black Mamba”, and the music video of the identical title had been launched on 17 November 2020.[4] As well as, a brief video was posted by which singer Karina chats together with her avatar, æ-Karina, whereas sitting comfortably on sofas and explains that in addition they trade messages through smartphone.[5]

In October 2021, SM Leisure launched “Savage”, the woman group’s first EP album,[6] which instantly stormed to the highest of the Korean charts and likewise prompted a stir internationally. This success earned aespa a spot on the principle stage on the Coachella Music Pageant in California. There, the 4 singers carried out three songs alongside their avatars, who had been projected onto a display screen. Quite a few YouTube movies posted by followers present this.[7]

In 2023, the time was ripe for a global tour by aespa entitled “SYNK: HYPER LINE”, with performances by the woman group and their avatars in varied nations in Southeast Asia, in addition to in america and Europe.[8] In 2024, the primary full-length studio album, “Armageddon”, was launched with ten songs, reaching quantity 2 on the Korean album charts and likewise showing on the worldwide long-play charts.[9] This was adopted by the second stay tour – “SYNK: Parallel Line” – which took the woman group to Japan, China, Thailand and Australia in 2024 and continued in North America and Europe in 2025.[10] It stays to be seen whether or not aespa’s two-world idea will work. The Okay-pop woman group capabilities like a traditional music act, with human songwriters and composers writing songs and producing albums. Stay performances additionally comply with a standard sample, with the æ avatars projected within the background. Solely the connection to the two.7 million followers (as of July 2025) who collect on the corporate’s personal platform Weverse[11] additionally features a digital part. Nevertheless, followers have additionally criticised the storyline of aespa for not all the time being understandable and tough to convey.[12] SM Leisure will nonetheless need to do a variety of inventive work to implement the unique idea.

Regardless of all of the uncertainties, the idea of aespa rapidly discovered imitators. In November 2021, South Korean firm Deep Studio Leisure offered the boy band Superkind,[13] which initially consisted of 4 actual members, Eugene, Geon, Daemon and SiO, in addition to one digital member, Saejin. Saejin was modelled on Adamsoft’s first digital performer, Adam, however because of AI know-how, he may very well be made way more sensible.[14] In contrast to to aespa, the avatar was an integral a part of the boy band and appeared equally with the opposite band members within the music and promotional movies, as may be seen within the first music video launched for the one “Watch Out” in June 2022.[15] The 5 band members carried out on a stage in a digital surroundings modelled after the Colosseum in Rome, with solely the keenest of observers capable of inform the distinction between the actual singers and their digital band-mates.

Shortly after the discharge of their debut single in July 2022, one other human member, JDV, grew to become a part of the boy band.[16] In December 2022, they had been joined by the digital singer Seung,[17] bringing the overall variety of Superkind members to seven.

In March 2023, Superkind’s second single, “Moody”, was launched, adopted by the EP “Profiles of the Future (Λ): 70%” in October of the identical 12 months. Nevertheless, album gross sales had been very modest, with 6,336 models bought within the first week, putting Superkind solely at quantity 22 on the South Korean Circle Album Chart.[18] After that, issues went quiet across the hybrid boy band. Then, on the morning of 11 April 2025, a put up appeared on X (previously Twitter) by which Deep Studio introduced the dissolution of the group and the mutual termination of contracts with the 5 human performers. No causes got for this resolution, however the AI firm thanked the artists for his or her cooperation and wished them properly for the long run.[19] Nevertheless, it may be assumed that there have been disagreements between the corporate and the human members of Superkind, by which financial components additionally performed a task. This instance reveals that AI-generated musicians aren’t any assure of success and that the excessive growth prices should first be justified.

Nevertheless, South Korea stays fertile floor for the event of AI-generated artists. On 8 November 2022, Metaverse Leisure, a subsidiary of South Korean recreation developer Netmarble Company, introduced the launch of the digital Okay-pop woman group MAVE for spring 2023.[20] In collaboration with the South Korean media group Kakao Leisure, which supplied monetary backing for the mission and is answerable for music distribution, the primary single, “Pandora”, was launched on 25 January 2023 as a music video on YouTube. Within the video, the 4 lifelike members of the woman group — Siu, Zena, Tyra and Marty — carry out in a futuristic-looking metropolis and sing a few hopeless future by which feelings have been misplaced, and about discovering hope once more in a digital world known as Idypia.[21] With the assistance of an AI voice generator, the digital singers are capable of carry out their songs not solely in Korean, but additionally in English, French and Bahasa, the official language of Indonesia. Nevertheless, the AI voices had been skilled with human performers and the dance efficiency within the video is predicated on movement seize know-how, which was already used for Hatsune Miku.[22] On 30 November 2023, MAVE’s second single, entitled “What’s Your Identify?”, was launched on YouTube.[23] Though the debut single had nearly 32 million views on YouTube and “What’s Your Identify?” was additionally clicked on nearly 12 million instances (as of August 2025), MAVE did not enter the South Korean singles charts.[24] This is also the rationale why no additional songs had been launched by the AI woman group from 2024 onwards.

It subsequently appears tough to create a purely digital AI act if there is no such thing as a thrilling storyline behind it. It’s subsequently simpler to derive an AI avatar from an current star. That is the case with MIDNATT, the alter ego of South Korean celebrity Lee Hyun, who fashioned the vocal group 8Eight along with Joo Hee and Baek Chan and loved success from 2007 to 2014.[25] 8Eight was signed to Korean music firm Massive Hit Leisure, which later grew to become HYBE Company. MIDNATT was developed by South Korean AI firm Supertone, which was acquired by HYBE in 2022 for US $32 million.[26]

Nevertheless, the follow-up mission got here from Supertone, which launched the digital woman group SYNDI8, consisting of the avatars Canary, Nest, Goyo and Raven, in July 2024. SYNDI8 “stay” within the digital NANSY Land, whose title is derived from Neural Evaluation & Synthesis. The intention is to provide voices as realistically as potential utilizing an AI mannequin. An attention-grabbing element that emerges from Supertone’s announcement about SYNDI8 is the aim of making mental property for AI-generated voices: “We discover the purposes of know-how within the music content material enterprise and to domesticate personal voice mental property (IP) to exhibit the capabilities of creations.”[29]

In contrast to MIDNATT and MAVE, nevertheless, SYNDI8 are manga-style comedian characters, not modelled after people. The EP “MVP”, launched in July 2024, featured music movies produced in comedian fashion for all three songs: “ATOTA”[30], “My Fantasy”[31] and “True Color”[32]. Reasonably than creating hyper-realistic representations of the singers, Supertone centered on producing voices that had been as sensible as potential with the assistance of AI. Nevertheless, with just a few thousand views between them, the movies show that SYNDI8 is an experiment that also wants additional growth.

Moreover the South Korean leisure corporations, the Chinese language know-how firm Tencent is especially concerned in growing AI-generated digital artists. In November 2022, Tencent Music Leisure, a Tencent subsidiary, introduced that it had produced over 1,000 music items utilizing the Lingyin Engine generative AI device. These have been streamed over 100 million instances in China. This know-how has additionally enabled the voices of the late Chinese language singers Teresa Teng and Anita Mui to be recreated.[33]

Tencent Music went one step additional with the Lucy mission. This can be a hyper-real digital pop star developed by the corporate’s personal Lyra Lab and offered to the general public in December 2022 through X (previously Twitter).[34] A month later, Lucy already had three songs within the Chinese language charts and quite a few singles on the Chinese language streaming platform QQ Music.[35] Nevertheless, if Tencent Music will get its manner, it is not going to cease at Lucy, however shall be joined by different AI-generated music avatars.

The evaluation of current AI-generated music avatars reveals that efficiently positioning them in the marketplace is tough. The more than likely path to success is to derive AI artists from human musicians, as demonstrated by aespa and MIDNATT. In these circumstances, followers have a degree of reference within the flesh-and-blood stars, who’re perceived as extra genuine and thus have larger identification potential. AI artists created from scratch discover it a lot more durable to succeed. In addition to the appreciable growth prices, advertising and marketing, promotion and distribution prices should be coated for them to turn into seen in the marketplace. Up to now, solely Hatsune Miku has succeeded in constructing a big, sustainable fan base that attends her concert events. The stay music enterprise particularly is the essential issue within the sustainable institution of an AI music star. As the instance of ABBA has already proven, an excessive amount of technical effort is required to ship the suitable stay expertise for the viewers. Easy 2D projections usually are not sufficient, and hologram know-how has not likely established itself in the marketplace. So, to construct up an AI-generated music star in a sustainable manner and make them profitable, along with good music, nice music movies and thrilling social media appearances, what is required above all is an immersive stay expertise that may win over the followers. As well as, a

Endnotes

[1] Korea Joong Ang Every day, “SM Leisure to debut new woman group, aespa”, October 26, 2022, accessed: 2025-08-28.

[2] SM Leisure Pressemitteilung, “Soo-Man Lee, chairman of SM Leisure Group, delivered a speech on the 1st World Cultural Business Discussion board as a consultant of the Korean cultural group!”, October 28, 2020, accessed: 2025-08-28.

[3] m.entertain.naver.com, “Yoo Ji-min debuts as Karina, member of SM Leisure’s new woman group ‘aespa’”, translated from Korean utilizing DeepL, October 28, 2020, accessed: 2025-08-28.

[4] YouTube, “aespa ‘Black Mamba’ MV”, November 17, 2020, accessed: 2025-08-28.

[5] YouTube, “aespa ‘MY, KARINA’”, October 28, 2020, accessed: 2025-08-28.

[6] Wikipedia, “Savage (EP)”, model of June 4, 2025, accessed: 2025-08-28.

[7] YouTube, “aespa full efficiency @coachella 2022”, April 24, 2022, accessed: 2025-08-28.

[8] NME, “aespa announce Europe, US legs of 2023 ‘SYNK: Hyper Line’ world tour”, Could 19, 2023, accessed: 2025-08-28.

[9] Wikipedia, “Armageddon (Aespa album)”, model of August 25, 2025, accessed: 2025-08-28.

[10] Wikipedia, “Synk: Parallel Line”, model of August 10, 2025, accessed: 2025-08-28.

[11] Weverse, “aespa”, n.d., accessed: 2025-08-28.

[12] Digiverse, “A brief historical past of digital artists”, October 12, 2022, accessed: 2025-08-28.

[13] Superkind is an anagram of NUKE, PRID and S. NUKE refers back to the digital members of the boy band, PRID to the human members, whereas the S stays a thriller that PRIDs and NUKEs should unravel on their journey; see ibid.

[14] YouTube, “SAEJIN, SUPERKIND, Debut Challenge”, January 22, 2022, accessed: 2025-08-29.

[15] YouTube, “SUPERKIND ‘WATCH OUT’, Official MV”, June 20, 2022, accessed: 2025-08-29.

[16] Korea JoongAng Every day, “Superkind has a member with a distinction — nevertheless it’s nearly undetectable”, July 28, 2022, accessed: 2025-08-29.

[17] KProfiles, “SUPERKIND Members Profile”, n.d., accessed: 2025-08-29.

[18] Circle Chart, “Album Chart 2023, Week 42”, October 21, 2023, accessed: 2025-08-29.

[19] The X-post was shared throughout quite a few on-line media retailers, together with allkpop, “Superkind formally disbands following contract conclusion with DEEPSTUDIO”, April 11, 2025, accessed: 2025-08-29.

[20] The Dailypost, “Netmarble F&C subsidiary Metaverse Leisure launches official web site”, November 8, 2022, accessed: 2025-08-29.

[21] YouTube, “Pandora”, January 25, 2023, accessed: 2025-08-29.

[22] Reuters, “Meet Mave: the AI-powered Okay-pop woman group that look nearly human and converse 4 languages”, March 17, 2023, accessed: 2025-08-29.

[23] YouTube, “MAVE_What’s My Identify”, November 30, 2023, accessed: 2025-08-29.

[24] Wikipedia, “Mave”, model of February 11, 2025, accessed: 2025-08-29.

[25] Wikipedia, “8Eight”, model of January 19, 2025, accessed: 2025-08-29.

[26] Music Enterprise Worldwide, “HYBE acquires faux voice AI firm Supertone in $32m deal (report)”, October 4, 2022, accessed: 2025-08-29.

[27] YouTube, “MIDNATT ‘Masquerade’ Official MV (Obtainable in 6 languages ENG/KR/JP/CH/ES/VN)”, Could 15, 2023, accessed: 2025-08-29.

[28] The Korean Herald, “Hybe opens up an period of ‘tech-tainment’ with new artist Midnatt”, Could 15, 2023, accessed: 2025-08-29.

[29] Cited in Music Enterprise Worldwide, “After being acquired by HYBE in a $32m deal final 12 months, voice cloning startup Supertone launches AI-powered digital pop group, SYNDI8”, July 2, 2024, accessed: 2025-08-29.

[30] YouTube, “SYNDI8 ‘ATOTA’ Official Visualizer”, July 10, 2024, accessed: 2025-08-29.

[31] YouTube, “SYNDI8 ‘My Fantasy’ Official Visualizer”, July 10, 2024, accessed: 2025-08-29.

[32] YouTube, “SYNDI8 ‘True Colour’ Official Visualizer”, July 10, 2024, accessed: 2025-08-29.

[33] Music Enterprise Worldwide, “Over 1,000 songs with human-mimicking AI vocals have been launched by Tencent Music in China. Certainly one of them has 100m streams”, November 15, 2022, accessed: 2025-09-01.

[34] X-Publish, “In the present day, TME introduced the debut of Lucy, who’s the primary super-realistic digital idol of the corporate”, December 12, 2022, accessed: 2025-09-01.

[35] Music Enterprise Worldwide, “Meet the digital artists backed by a number of the world’s largest leisure corporations”, Could 22, 2023, accessed: 2025-09-01.