Spotify expands AI remix and covers project with Merlin partnership
Quick Answer
Spotify is expanding its AI remix and covers project through a partnership with Merlin, adding over 30,000 independent labels.
Quick Take
This initiative aims to allow fans to create artist-approved remixes and covers, differentiating itself from other AI music startups by ensuring artist consent and compensation.
Key Points
- Merlin joins Universal Music Group in Spotify's AI music initiative.
- The new tool will allow fan-made covers and remixes with artist consent.
- Spotify aims to create a legal framework for AI-generated music.
- A research preview of the product will be available to select users.
- The tool will launch as a paid add-on, generating revenue for artists.
DeepSignal Analysis
What happened
Spotify is expanding its AI remix and covers initiative through a partnership with Merlin, which adds over 30,000 independent labels. This project will enable fans to create remixes and covers with artist consent, distinguishing it from other AI music ventures.
Key evidence
- Spotify's new AI music product will allow fans to create covers and remixes with the consent of participating artists.
- The partnership with Merlin brings over 30,000 independent labels into the AI music project, enhancing its catalog.
- Spotify's co-CEO stated that their approach ensures artist consent, credit, and compensation, positioning it as a legal method for fan engagement.
Why it matters
This initiative could reshape how fans interact with music by allowing them to create derivative works legally. By ensuring artist consent and compensation, Spotify aims to address concerns surrounding AI-generated music, potentially setting a standard in the industry. The partnership with Merlin may also enhance the diversity of music available for remixing, appealing to a broader audience.
What to watch
📖 Reader Mode
~2 min readDuring its second-quarter earnings call on Tuesday, Spotify again teased the upcoming release of a new product that will allow music fans to leverage AI to make covers and remixes of artists’ music, with the artists’ consent.
The company also announced that Merlin, a licensing partner for independent labels and distributors, has now joined Universal Music Group (UMG) on the new AI music effort. The deal brings more than 30,000 labels from Merlin’s network to the product, which will allow fan-made covers and remixes by artists who agree to participate.
Spotify has positioned its AI music product as being significantly different from the more controversial AI music startups that have been used to create fully artificial songs. Instead, Spotify co-CEO Gustav Söderström told investors on Tuesday’s call that the company’s AI music product will be about “real artists, not fake artists.”
“We want artists to be consenting [to add] their work into this catalog, so people can play around with covers and remixes based on their art,” added co-CEO Alex Norström. “We also obviously want to give them credit. And last but not least…we not only have the consent and give credit, but we also drive the compensation for this. So, really, we’re talking about the first legal way to partake in this AI tailwind that we see coming for interactive music,” he said.
AI music has flooded streaming services. Music streamer Deezer recently noted that more than 50% of daily track uploads were generated with AI, up from 10% in January 2025.
The company told investors that a research preview of the fan remix and covers product would initially be made available to a subset of users. Spotify also noted that it would not require a full music catalog to get started. The company did not say when the preview would arrive.
The new tool will launch as a paid add-on, creating an additional revenue stream for artists, Spotify previously said.
“Our remix and covers I think is an incredibly exciting product again because there is no one else that can really do this,” Söderström said. “Normal generative music will happen with or without us. This product will not happen without us, and it needs to exist so that existing artists can can participate in this.”
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Sarah has worked as a reporter for TechCrunch since August 2011. She joined the company after having previously spent over three years at ReadWriteWeb. Prior to her work as a reporter, Sarah worked in I.T. across a number of industries, including banking, retail and software.
You can contact or verify outreach from Sarah by emailing sarahp@techcrunch.com or via encrypted message at sarahperez.01 on Signal.
— Originally published at techcrunch.com
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