Paul McCartney joins music industry protest against AI with silent track

At two minutes 45 seconds it’s about the same length as With a Little Help From My Friends. But Paul McCartney’s first new recording in five years lacks the sing-along tune and jaunty guitar chops because there’s barely anything there. The former Beatle, arguably Britain’s greatest living songwriter, is releasing a track of an almost completely silent recording studio as part of a music industry protest against copyright theft by artificial intelligence companies. In place of catchy melodies and evocative lyrics there is only quiet hiss and the odd clatter. It suggests that if AI companies unfairly exploit musicians’ intellectual property to train their generative AI models, the creative ecosystem will be wrecked and original music silenced. McCartney, 83 and currently touring North America, has added the track to the B-side of an LP called Is This What We Want?, which is filled with other silent recordings and will be pressed on vinyl and released later this month. McCartney’s contribution comes as musicians and artists step up their campaign to persuade the UK government to stop technology companies from training AI models on their creative output without approval or paying royalties. Meanwhile, Britain faces anti-regulation pressure from Donald Trump’s White House. The album track listing spells out “the British government must not legalise music theft to benefit AI companies”. Ed Newton-Rex, a composer and campaigner for copyright fairness behind the protest album, said: “I am very concerned the government is paying more attention to US tech companies’ interests rather than British creatives’ interests.” Other artists already backing the campaign include Sam Fender, Kate Bush, Hans Zimmer and the Pet Shop Boys. McCartney’s new contribution is called (bonus track) and like his best songs, it could be said to have a beginning, a middle and an end. It fades up quickly and begins with 55 seconds of tape hiss before 15 seconds of indeterminate clattering that could be someone opening a door and pacing about, before settling down to another 80 seconds of rustle-punctuated hiss and concluding with a slow and poignant fadeout. McCartney has been among leading voices in British music voicing concern at the ministers’ plans forge a new deal between creatives and AI companies such as Open AI, Google, Anthropic and Elon Musk’s xAI, which demand access to huge volumes of training information including text, images and music. Related: Elton John calls UK government ‘absolute losers’ over AI copyright plans “We[’ve] got to be careful about it because it could just take over and we don’t want that to happen, particularly for the young composers and writers [for] who, it may be the only way they[’re] gonna make a career,” McCartney has said of AI. “If AI wipes that out, that would be a very sad thing indeed.” Bush, another artist involved in the protest album, has said: “In the music of the future, will our voices go unheard?” The composer Max Richter said: “The government’s proposals would impoverish creators, favouring those automating creativity over the people who compose our music, write our literature, paint our art.” The government has consulted on allowing an exception to UK copyright law for “text and data mining”, which includes the possibility of requiring copyright holders to actively opt out of their work being used to train AI models. Ministers face the difficulty of balancing the interests of creative industries, which add £125bn annually to the UK economy, and US tech companies who want light regulation and recently announced more than £30bn in investments, mostly in datacentres. Related: An AI-generated band got 1m plays on Spotify. Now music insiders say listeners should be warned A new legal system for AI and copyright is not expected to be debated in parliament before 2026. In the meantime, the government has signed deals with AI companies including Open AI, Google and Anthropic to boost AI adoption across government and the wider economy. Trump has said: “We have to allow AI to use that [copyrighted] pool of knowledge without going through the complexity of contract negotiations” and warned international governments not to “make rules and regulations that … make it impossible” for AI companies to do business. Beeban Kidron, a cross-bench peer and film director who campaigns for copyright protection, told the Guardian: “The government is trying to play both sides and convincing neither.” She added: “They have proven themselves unfit to govern in the economic interests of the creators.” A government source said Liz Kendall, the secretary of state for science, innovation and technology, was committed to finding a solution between AI firms and creatives and “recognises both of these sectors are British success stories and she is talking to both sides”. There was concern when Kendall appointed a special adviser in September who had previously argued: “Whether or not you philosophically believe the big AI firms should compensate content creators, they in practice will never legally have to.” Responding to McCartney’s intervention, a government spokesperson said it put the interests of the UK’s citizens and businesses first. “We’ve always been clear on the need to work with both the creative industries and AI sector to drive AI innovation and ensure robust protections for creators,” they said. “We are bringing together both British and global companies, alongside voices beyond the AI and creative sectors, to ensure we can capture the broadest possible range of expert views as we consider next steps.”