Deicide Drummer Steve Asheim Defends Use of A.I. Artwork: “We’re Just Going With The Times”
At this point, I think we can all pretty much agree that A.I. sucks most of the time. Sure, it’s got its uses, but when it starts taking money out of people’s pockets by serving as a soulless replacement for something an actual human being can do, that’s not a good thing — especially when it comes to art.
Right?
Apparently not everyone agrees with that sentiment. During a recent interview with Poland’s Soundterror, Deicide drummer Steve Asheim had some words about A.I., given the controversy that cropped up earlier this year when the band unveiled the cover art for their latest album Banished By Sin. As you can probably guess from context clues, people on the internet accused the band of using A.I. to create said art and as a result, people were pissed.
Though Asheim in the past has said the cover was a reference to their 1900 self-titled album’s cover, he also stated that it was designed by an actual person who got paid for their work. Still, in this most recent interview, he suggested that maybe A.I. is inevitable and that there’s nothing we can do to stop its progress.
“They’re doing it with music and with writing, and A.I.’s getting into everything. How do you stop it? I don’t know. Go back to a guy with a paintbrush and a canvas and that kind of thing. Sure, they still exist. A lot of people do their art on computers with art programs or whatever. I don’t know the names of any of them, but I know people are going with the latest technology, and this seems to be it.”
Later on in the interview, he noted the fan reaction to the cover. Given the new nature of A.I. and the real world implications it could have in the very near future, he said he understands where people are coming from, but that it’s not too far off from when computer generated imagery first came into its own.
“If there’s a backlash — there’s usually some kind of backlash against stuff every so often, so we’ll see how that plays out and what will really happen for our next record. We’ll see what’s available then. We’ll see, I guess. We’re just going with the times.
“In ’92, for Legion, we did computer art. And I don’t know if you would — they weren’t considering it A.I. at the time, certainly, but it wasn’t a guy with a paintbrush or anything. No one had a problem with that then. I don’t know what the problem is now.”
