The Dictatorship
Why this R&B hit is causing alarm in the music industry
Months ago, a musician named Xania Monet went viral on TikTok with a song called “How Was I supposed to Know?” In short videos, women in plaid shirts mouthed along to its mournful chorus under captions that read: “Pov: you found that one song that speaks for your soul.” Three-year-olds in the back seat of cars fumbled their way through its lyrics about growing up without a dad and falling in love with the wrong men. Listeners wept, alone in bathrooms.
There is no Xania Monet. She is a digital avatar created by a 31-year-old woman named Telisha Nikki Jones.
“How Was I supposed to Know?” made its way to radio, rose up the charts and just landed at No. 30 on the Billboard Adult R&B Airplay chart. Its success prompted Billboard to run an article marking the historic moment:
“The first known instance of an AI-based act to earn a spot on a Billboard radio chart.”
There is no Xania Monet. She is a digital avatar created by a 31-year-old woman named Telisha Nikki Jones from small-town Mississippi. Jones, an affable entrepreneur and a self-described creatorhas been writing poems since she was 24, and about four months ago she began teaching herself how to use artificial intelligence tools such as CapCut and fal.ai to create a digital persona. She uploaded her poems to an app called Suno, which set them to music. Other than Jones’ words, everything — from Monet’s voice to the melody it sang to the piano chords accompanying it — was computer-generated. Jones began to share the songs.
In short order, she was famous. Or Xania Monet was. Soon, Jones had a $3 million record dealprompting some human musicians — including R&B stalwarts Get down and SZA — to cry foul. But Jones sees the whole situation in historical terms.
“Anytime something new comes about and it challenges the norm and challenges what we’re used to, you’re going to get strong reactions behind it,” Jones told Gayle King this week on “CBS Mornings.” “And I just feel like AI — it’s the new era that we’re in. And I look at it as a tool, as an instrument. Utilize it.”
We tend to associate fears of replacement-by-machine with industrial laborers. But music has been central to the story of automation for a long time.
In the late 19th century, the invention of the the player piano — a self-playing instrument, programmed via something that resembled an early computer punch card — changed the industry. Player pianos were such a symbol of the threat of automation that in 1952, when Kurt Vonnegut wrote his famous novel about an automated society, he called it “Player Piano.”
Anytime something new comes about and it challenges the norm and challenges what we’re used to, you’re going to get strong reactions behind it.”
TELISHA NIKKI JONES
Musicians feared their livelihood would be threatened by recorded music. John Philip Sousa — he of the famous Sousa marches — was so alarmed he published a polemic in Appleton’s Magazine called “The Menace of Mechanical Music.”
“Sweeping across the country with the speed of a transient fashion in slang or Panama hats,” Sousa wrote, hopelessly dating himself, “comes now the mechanical device to sing for us a song or play for us a piano, in substitute for human skill, intelligence, and soul.”
Sousa was, in large part, writing to advocate that royalties from recordings — “mechanical rights” — should be paid to musicians. But he also worried that the phonograph, among other machines, would lead to “a marked deterioration in American music and musical taste, an interruption in the musical development of the country, and a host of other injuries to music in its artistic manifestations.” To drive the point home, the article was accompanied by cartoons, one of which depicted a baby crying as a phonograph blared in its ear. Nobody tell him about Spotify’s “White Noise Baby Sleep” playlist.
Sousa’s screed was an early entry in what became an increasingly common modern genre. Every time a new music machine was invented — like, say, a synthesizer — the musicians union would oppose it. People like me would write articles like this decrying it, and users like Telisha Nikki Jones would explain that it’s a tool, an instrument, like any other. Then, 10 years later, the change would be so widespread that nobody really could remember what the fuss was all about.
If you, like me, are happy that we live in a world of recorded sound, then you may be tempted to think the mainstreaming of AI music is — much like the phonograph — no big deal. Or a big deal that we can and should metabolize.
I would like, though, to do my best Sousa impression and argue the opposite.
Tools like Suno have effectively recycled the work of musicians in the past without their permission, let alone their participation.
In her TV appearance, Jones shows King how she makes a song — pasting in the words of one of her poems and typing in a series of prompts: “Slow-tempo, rnb, deep female soulful vocals, light guitar, heavy drums.” And then she hits create and is presented with two finished recordings. It is perhaps for this reason that Monet’s first album, made in just a few months, has 24 songs on it.
It’s worth keeping in mind that all of this is only possible because, as per Suno’s court filings in response to a lawsuit filed by Universal Music Group, Capitol Records, Sony Music, Atlantic Records, Warner Music and the Recording Industry Association of America, Suno was trained on “essentially all music files of reasonable quality that are accessible on the open internet.” Tens of millions of recordings, many lifetimes’ worth of creative labor, hidden beneath the create button.
Up until now, the dominant music technologies have been about music capture and reproduction. They do make it easier to make music, but someone has still always needed to compose that music, even if it takes fewer and fewer people to record a song. AI music obviates that need, and it accomplishes this because tools like Suno have effectively recycled the work of musicians in the past without their permission, let alone their participation. And, perversely, it could lead to such a glut of music that the economies of listening would be increasingly unfriendly to human-made songs.
This is what concerns me most. The vast majority of AI-generated music will be bland and enervating. But in our overwhelming media ecosystem, some people may just stop caring. Spotify has already been caught replacing real bands with fake ones to avoid paying royalties on streamed music via its Perfect Fit Content program. Many of us let algorithms dictate what we hear next, as they guide us through a never-ending stream of background music we have never heard before, will never hear again and are slowly becoming inured to entirely. Under the circumstances, who’s going to notice if that music is being generated, rather than curated, by an AI?
There is something unsettling about Billboard’s announcement of Monet’s historic achievement. It’s hedged. The publication calls “How Was I supposed to Know?” the “first known instance of an AI-based act to earn a spot on a Billboard radio chart.” It’s a “potentially historic development.”
It becomes clear that the famed charts have absolutely no faith that they can tell whether or not a song made by AI has come their way before. The difference here is that Jones has disclosed it.
“I literally was crying in my bathroom to your music,” one commenter wrote on Jones’ Facebook page. “And then I found it was AI.”
How were they supposed to know?
Ben Naddaff-Hafrey
Ben Naddaff-Hafrey is a writer and senior producer at Pushkin Industries, where he appears on Revisionist History and The Last Archive. You can follow his newsletter here.
President Donald Trump and top administration officials said Sunday that Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents will arrive at the nation’s airports on Monday to handle security at exceedingly long lines driven by a shortage of TSA workers.
“I look forward to moving ICE in on Monday, and have already told them to, ‘GET READY.’ NO MORE WAITING, NO MORE GAMES!” Trump said on Truth Social.
Tom Homan, the White House border czar who will lead the effort, provided few details but confirmed the plan on BLN’s “State of the Union,” saying, “It’s a work in progress, but we will be at airports tomorrow.” DHS spokesperson Lauren Bis said later that “hundreds of ICE officers” would be deployed to airports “adversely impacted,” but she did not specify which airports.
It was unclear whether ICE officers would be conducting pat-down procedures but Homan suggested their focus would be on security instead of screening. “A highly-trained ICE law enforcement officer can cover an exit, that relieves TSA to go to screening,” he said, adding that the priority will be on “those large airports where there’s a long wait, like three hours.”
DHS and ICE did not immediately respond to MS NOW’s request for comment on whether officers will be wearing masks at the airports to which they are deployed. But Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy suggested Sunday that Democrats are the reason why federal immigration and border officers wear masks.
“Democrats want ICE to take off their face masks. The problem with that is we know the Democrats are going to want to dox those ICE agents, go to their homes, harass their kids,” he said on ABC News.
The ongoing partial government shutdown, which began after funding for the Department of Homeland Security lapsedon Feb. 14, has forced Transportation and Security Administration workers to go unpaid —with hundreds of them quitting or not showing up for work, severely disrupting air travel.
Duffy said security lines will “get much worse” this week. He predicted more TSA agents will quit by Friday, when they’ll go without another paycheck unless lawmakers reach a deal.
Trump said on Saturday that ICE agents would “do Security like no one has ever seen before, including the immediate arrest of all Illegal Immigrants who have come into our Country, with heavy emphasis on those from Somalia.”
Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey, whose city has been ground zero for the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown, said Sunday on MS NOW’s “The Weekend” that Trump “doesn’t actually mean that he’s going to keep people secure.”
“We all know that’s not the goal. The goal is to terrorize people,” Frey said. When asked if he thought the president was racist for his targeting of Somalis, the mayor said, “I think the answer is yes.”
Speaking on the Senate floor during a rare weekend session on Sunday, Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., lambasted Trump’s plan to send ICE agents to airports, calling it “really disturbing.”
“It’s a plan that has no planning. It’s another impulsive action from Donald Trump,” Schumer said. “When he acts impulsively there’s usually trouble. Whenever Donald Trump acts impulsively with no follow through, there’s trouble.”
Republican Sen. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska also criticized Trump’s plan, saying that “air dropping” agents to airports is “not a fix.”
The Association of Flight Attendants said ICE officers lack the kind of specialized training that the TSA’s transportation security officers get. “Furthermore, the introduction of ICE agents into airports creates contradictory missions, as attempts to question passengers about immigration status may distract them from ensuring airport security,” the union said.
And Everett Kelley, president of the American Federation of Government Employeesthe largest federal workers’ union, said, “More than 50,000 TSA employees have worked without pay for over five weeks. Hundreds have quit. And Washington’s answer isn’t to pay them. It’s to send ICE agents to do their jobs.”
Congress remains gridlocked over DHS funding, with Democrats demanding reforms to ICE operations after the fatal shooting of two U.S. citizens — Renee Good and Alex Pretti— in Minneapolis. Republicans have rejected proposalsto reopen much of Homeland Security, which includes TSA and ICE.
Airline executives from United Airlines, American Airlines, Southwest Airlines and others last week called on Congress to end the shutdownwriting in a joint letter that federal employees working without pay is “simply unacceptable.”
“This problem is solvable, and there are solutions on the table,” they wrote. “Now it’s up to you, Congress, to move forward on bipartisan proposals that will get federal aviation workers—including TSA officers, U.S. Customs clearance officers at airports and air
traffic controllers—paid during shutdowns.”
Mychael Schnell and Emily Hung contributed to this report.
Erum Salam is a breaking news reporter for MS NOW, with a focus on how global events and foreign policy shape U.S. politics. She previously was a breaking news reporter for The Guardian.
Cuba is “preparing” for the possibility of U.S. military aggression against the Caribbean island nation, a top Cuban official said Sunday.
“Our military is always prepared, and, in fact, it is preparing these days for the possibility of military aggression,” Cuba’s deputy foreign minister, Carlos Fernández de Cossío, told NBC News. “We would be naive, if looking at what’s happening around the world, we would not do that.”
Speaking on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” Fernández de Cossío added, “But we truly hope that it does not occur. We don’t see why it would have to occur. We find no justification whatsoever.”
He spoke as Cuba began restoring power after a nationwide electricity blackout, which Cuban officials have blamed on a U.S. energy blockade driven by President Donald Trump threats to impose tariffs on any country that provides oil to Cuba. Cuba’s president, Miguel Díaz-Canal, acknowledged last week that his government is in talks with the U.S. government.
Trump and Secretary of State Marco Rubio have repeatedly warned that Cuba could be next to see U.S. military intervention, adding to a growing number of countries, including Venezuela and Iran, where the U.S. military has interfered.
“I do believe I will be having the honor of taking Cuba,” Trump told reporters last week in the Oval Office. “Whether I free it, take it. Think I can do anything I want with it, you want to know the truth.”
Shortly after U.S. forces captured Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro in January at Trump’s direction, Rubio said“I don’t think it’s any mystery that we are not big fans of the Cuban regime, who, by the way, are the ones that were propping up Maduro.”
Rubio called the Cuban government “a huge problem.”
Trump’s foreign policy has run counter to his campaign promise to end costly warsarguing that Americans will be safer and better off as a result of such interventions. The joint U.S.-Israel war with Iran, for which the objectives remain unclear, has sent the price of oil and gas skyrocketing and deepened instability across the Middle East.
Erum Salam is a breaking news reporter for MS NOW, with a focus on how global events and foreign policy shape U.S. politics. She previously was a breaking news reporter for The Guardian.
The Dictatorship
Trump threatens attacks on Iranian power plants if Tehran fails to open the Strait of Hormuz
CAIRO (AP) — Iran responded Sunday with threats of its own, a day after President Donald Trumpwarned the United States will “obliterate” Iran’s power plants if Tehran fails to fully open the Strait of Hormuzin 48 hours and Iranian missiles struck two cities near Israel’s main nuclear research center, injuring dozens and shattering apartment buildings.
The developments signaled the war in the Middle East, now in its fourth weekwas moving in a dangerous new direction.
Sirens blared across Israel as Iran launched new barrages Sunday. In the country’s south, residents faced the devastation in the cities of Dimona and Arad. In northern Israel, a man was killed in a strike by the Lebanese militant Hezbollah group.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu toured Arad and said it was a “miracle” that no one was killed by the blast, which heavily damaged several buildings. But he said that if all residents had rushed to shelters, no one would have been hurt and urged all to heed the sirens.
Iran responds to Trump’s ultimatum
Trump said on Saturday that he would give Iran 48 hours to open the vital Strait of Hormuzor face a new round of attacks. He said the U.S. would destroy “various POWER PLANTS, STARTING WITH THE BIGGEST ONE FIRST!”
He may have meant the Bushehr nuclear power plant, Iran’s biggest, which was already hit last week, or Damavand, a natural gas plant near Tehran, Iran’s capital.
In turn, Iran warned early Sunday that any strike on its energy facilities would prompt attacks on U.S. and Israeli energy and infrastructure assets — specifically information technology and desalination facilities — in the region, according to a statement citing an Iranian military spokesperson carried by state media and semiofficial outlets.
The Strait of Hormuz connects the Persian Gulf to the Indian Ocean and is a critical pathway for the world’s flow of oil. Attacks on commercial shipsand threats of further strikes have stopped nearly all tankers from carrying oil, gas and other goodsthrough the passage, leading to cuts in output from some of the world’s largest oil producers, because their crude has nowhere to go.
Seyed Ali Mousavi, Iran’s envoy to the International Maritime Organization, said in remarks carried by two Iranian news agencies that navigating the strait is possible for “everyone except enemies” — indicating Tehran would determine which vessels are allowed passage. Iran has already approved the passage of ships through the waterway to China and elsewhere in Asia.
Iran strikes area near Israeli nuclear site
Israel’s military said it was not able to intercept missiles that hit Dimona and Arad on Saturday, the largest cities near the Negev Desert nuclear center. It was the first time Iranian missiles penetrated Israel’s air defense systems in the area.
“If the Israeli regime is unable to intercept missiles in the heavily protected Dimona area, it is, operationally, a sign of entering a new phase of the battle,” Iran’s Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf said on X.
Rescue workers said at least 64 people were taken to hospitals after the direct hit in Arad. Dimona is about 20 kilometers (12 miles) west of the nuclear research center and Arad around 35 kilometers (22 miles) north.
Israel’s hard-line national security minister, Itamar Ben-Gvir, visited Arad on Sunday, saying that Israel is in a “historic battle” against Iran and that it must “continue until victory.”
Israel is believed to possess nuclear weapons, though it doesn’t confirm or denythis. The U.N. nuclear watchdog said on X it had not received reports of damage to the Israeli center or any abnormal radiation levels.
Israel denies responsibility for attack on Natanz
Tehran’s main nuclear enrichment site at Natanzwas hit earlier on Saturday. Israel denied responsibility for the attack and the Iranian judiciary’s official news agency, Mizan, said there was no leakage.
The Pentagon declined to comment on the strike on Natanz, which was also hit in the first week of the ongoing war and in the 12-day warlast June.
The U.N. watchdog — the International Atomic Energy Agency — has said the bulk of Iran’s estimated 972 pounds (441 kilograms) of enriched uranium is elsewhere, beneath the rubble at its Isfahan facility.
The U.S. and Israel have offered shifting rationalesfor the war, from hoping to foment an uprisingthat topples Iran’s leadership to eliminating its nuclear and missile programsand its support for armed proxies. There have been no signs of an uprising, while internet restrictions limit information from Iran.
The war’s effects are felt far beyond the Middle East, raising food and fuel prices.
So far in Iran, the death toll in the war has surpassed 1,500, the state broadcaster reported Saturday, citing the health ministry. In Israel, 15 people have been killed by Iranian missiles. Four others have died in the occupied West Bank. At least 13 U.S. military members have been killed, along with well over a dozen civilians in Gulf nations.
Hezbollah claims deadly strike on northern Israel
Hezbollah said it was behind a strike on Sunday that killed a man in the northern Israeli town of Misgav Am in what the Israeli military said “seemed to be” a rocket attack. Israeli medics said they found the man dead in his car and released a video showing two vehicles ablaze.
Hezbollah, an ally of Iran, launched strikes on Israel soon after the U.S.-Israeli attack on Iran started on Feb. 28, saying it was in retaliation for the killing of Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Israel struck back, bombarding Lebanon and targeting Hezbollah in deadly airstrikes, expanding its presence in southern Lebanon and amassing more troops near the border.
Lebanese authorities say Israel’s strikes have killed more than 1,000 people and displaced more than 1 million.
Crash in Qatar
Qatar said Sunday that all seven people aboard a Qatari helicopter that crashed the previous day in the Gulf Arab nation’s territorial waters are dead — including three Turkish nationals, a military officer and two civilians.
The confirmation came after the body of the missing Qatari pilot was found on Sunday. The crash was blamed on a “technical malfunction.”
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