Dr. Dre has revealed he uses AI while producing music, defending the technology as a “new tool for creativity”.
The rapper and producer discussed the divisive topic alongside his longtime business partner Jimmy Iovine in a new interview with the New York Times published today (August 23).
Dre compared resistance to AI with the opposition that initially greeted drum machines and synthesisers.
“I had a discussion with a few people a few days ago,” he said. “They were against AI and I’m like, ‘OK, you sound like the person that would have been against the drum machine when it came out’. Or synthesisers, right? It’s a new tool for creativity. Some people are afraid of learning new things.”
He continued: “I’m embracing it. I can’t wait to see what’s going to happen with this.”
Asked whether he was using AI while producing, he explained that he was employing it “as a tool to see what it would do with what I just did.”
The producer also dismissed the suggestion that the technology poses a threat to musicians, saying: “I think the only people that see it as a threat are the people who have trouble creating.”
Iovine was similarly enthusiastic. “I’m very pro-AI in music creation,” he said. “I don’t see the downside at all. There will be some crappy music. There’s crappy music now. In the studio, when gifted people have AI, they’re going to make better records.”
Dre and Iovine have worked together since the ’90s and co-founded Beats Electronics, which Apple purchased for $3billion in 2014.
Iovine has previously predicted that AI would become “massive” in songwriting. Speaking in 2023, he said it could help songwriters experiment when they were struggling for ideas, although he also warned that formulaic approaches could produce popularity but not enduring greatness.
The use of AI in music continues to be hotly debated. Earlier this month, Daft Punk’s Thomas Bangalter described it as “a way to bypass the creative process”, arguing that entering prompts into a system runs counter to the deeper and more instinctive process involved in making art.
Others, including Mac DeMarco, SZA and Lorde, have been very critical of the growing influence of AI, with Jack Antonoff slamming musicians who use it as “godless whores”.
Tyga, on the other hand, confirmed that he used AI in the making of his album ‘$tarface’, and compared the backlash to the initial reaction to Auto-Tune.
A recent study, meanwhile, claimed that AI could be detected in approximately 40 per cent of music released during July 2026, despite nearly a third of the artists flagged by the detection software denying having used the technology.
Spotify recently announced an AI-labelling system, while Apple Music is set to introduce labels for AI-generated material later this year. Bandcamp, meanwhile, has outright banned music made using AI from its platform.
As for Dre, his recent projects include producing Snoop Dogg’s 2024 album ‘Missionary’, a spiritual sequel to his classic 1993 debut ‘Doggystyle’, while he has said he does not listen to much modern hip-hop and dislikes the majority of what he has heard.
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