FN Meka Source: Virtual Humans / Virtual Humans
Artificial intelligence rapper FN Meka has been dropped from Capitol Records. The virtual rapper was not received well, even though he has 10 million followers on TikTok. FN Meka looks racially ambiguous and the n-word is spread throughout his lyrics. There was also an image of him being beaten in prison by an officer, which was cringeworthy as well. This led to criticism from the Black community, who equated this to black face and cultural appropriation.
“CMG has severed ties with the FN Meka project, effective immediately,” the label said in a statement to The New York Times. “We offer our deepest apologies to the Black community for our insensitivity in signing this project without asking enough questions about equity and the creative process behind it. We thank those who have reached out to us with constructive feedback in the past couple of days-your input was invaluable as we came to the decision to end our association with the project.”
FN Meka was created by a company called Factory New that “specializes in virtual beings.” His voice comes from a human but his lyrics and tempo came from artificial intelligence. Anthony Martini, who is one of the Factory New founders, said FN Meka is indeed Black. He told the Times that this virtual rapper was “not this malicious plan of white executives. It’s literally no different from managing a human artist, except that it’s digital.”
Martini also pointed out that FN Meka was created by a diverse team of creatives.
“I’m the only white person involved,” he said.
Factory New thought they were doing something innovative by intersecting music and artificial intelligence but their plan backfired.
“The question was: How do we break an avatar as if it was a real artist and not a spectacle? It unfortunately turned into a spectacle anyway,” Martini said.
FN Meka’s first single “Florida Water” featuring Gunna and a gamer named Clix was released on Aug. 12.
