Black Artists Sound Off on Why AI Rapper FN Meka Was So Horribly Offensive

Artificial intelligence disrupted the music industry this week when a major recording label signed—and then quickly dropped—a “robot rapper” who casually dropped the N-word in their lyrics.

Many Black artists felt the decision to sign the AI rapper in the first place was a racist slap in the face.

“Real talk, anybody who was involved with research, development, and signing this artist at Capitol music should have their resignation submitted or their jobs terminated,” rock singer Ali Adkins of Ali A and the Agency in Phoenix told The Daily Beast. “Because that just means you don’t get 50 fucks about the music. You just care about making a [dollar].”

FN Meka, the rapping robot, was created in 2019 by Anthony Martini and Brandon Le, two non-Black men who are co-founders of the virtual reality record label Factory New, according to XXL Magazine.

The digital rapper, who had tan skin, flaunted green braids in a faux hawk, and tattoos that were inked on his shaven head, in between his eyebrows, under an eye, and down the side of his face, suggesting gang designs. He wore a septum ring, a gold grill, and a black puffer jacket that has long been emblematic of hip-hop culture. His eyes shone a bright neon turquoise.

McQuay Morton, a 15-year-old pianist who has trained at the Washington Jazz Arts Institute and currently attends the Governor’s School for the Arts in Virginia, insisted FN Meka is an offensive representation of Black people that caters to stereotypes while disregarding the diversity and versatility of Black musicians.

“Representation…means accurately depicting all Black people from all backgrounds, places, and experiences,” he told The Daily Beast. “FN Meka represents all the general stereotypes of what a Black rapper is.”

In an interview with Music Business Worldwide last year, Martini told the outlet that the digital rapper was created “using thousands of data points compiled from video games and social media.”

“The old model of finding talent is inefficient and unreliable. It requires spending time scouring the internet, traveling to shows, flying to meetings, expending resources all in search of the magic combination of qualities that just might translate into a superstar act,” Martini said in the interview. “Now we can literally custom-create artists using elements proven to work, greatly increasing the odds of success.”

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He explained that the robot has a human voice, but everything else is algorithm-driven, including the lyrics.

“If a song is good, people will listen to it,” Martini continued. “Most hits are written by teams of people who get paid to make music that will ‘sell.’ We think machines can eventually run this process more efficiently than humans.”

By August 2022, FN Meka had amassed over 10 million followers on TikTok. The digital rapper’s social profile included a clip of his new song “Florida Water,” videos of his extravagant digital lifestyle with Rolls Royces, outlandish accessories, and bling. FN Meka was an internet personality that seemingly thrived off of being over-the-top.

On Aug. 14, Capitol Music Group announced it was signing FN Meka—the world’s first-ever music deal with augmented reality, according to Music Business Worldwide. The label’s executive vice president of experiential marketing and business development, Ryan Ruden, said FN Meka’s combination of music and technology “is just a preview of what’s to come.”

Social media users were quick to accuse the AI rapper of embodying racist stereotypes and pointed to his casual use of the N-word in songs.

“The AI rapper is the natural progression of the digital blackface I’ve been talking about for years…” @NotLaja tweeted Tuesday.

“Do you know how many ppl had to agree before signing FN MEKA? A lot,” @MajestyRia tweeted. “They all thought it was a great idea. They all saw dollar signs & felt innovative without any regard to the culture they’re actively exploiting daily. Capitol Records is under Universal Music Group btw. Shame!”

Activist group Industry Blackout, which is dedicated to supporting Black people in the music industry, penned an Instagram post to Capitol Records that put it bluntly: “Have you lost your FN minds?”

“It has come to our attention that your company has decided to partner with Factory New on signing the artificially designed ‘rapper’ FN Meka,” the group said in a public Instagram post. “While we applaud innovation in tech that connects listeners to music and enhances the experience, we find fault in the lack of awareness in how offensive this caricature is. It is a direct insult to the Black community and our culture. An amalgamation of gross stereotypes, appropriative mannerisms that derive from Black artists, complete with slurs infused in lyrics.”

“For your company to approve this shows a serious lack of diversity and resounding amount of tone deaf leadership,” the post continued, adding photos from FN Meka’s account featuring the character posing as a victim of police brutality and lyrics containing the N-word. “This is simply unacceptable and will not be tolerated.”

As the backlash continued to mount against the AI rapper, Capitol Records announced it was dropping the deal with FN Meka on Tuesday, Variety reported.

“[Capitol Music Group] has severed ties with the FN Meka project, effective immediately. 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,” the company said in a statement. “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.”

In a separate statement to The Daily Beast, the company said it cut ties with FN Meka “the moment new facts came to light regarding equity and the creative process.”

But for some, the damage had already been done

“‘We apologize to the Black community.’ No the fuck you don’t. The Black community is the reason why your record labels still fucking exist,” said Adkins. “This is another example of white people loving and exposing Black culture to make a buck. …You would have nothing to steal if Black people didn’t exist. You would have nothing to replicate, to manufacture.”

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Ohio radio personality DJ J.Dough called FN Meka an “industry plant.”

“It’s like something the industry put there to capitalize off of it, basically make a mockery of Black culture,” he said in an interview with The Daily Beast. “And even from the way it looks to the way it talks, what he raps about, is just like, you know, ‘This is what we think Black people may like and what they want. So, let’s make a character to just make fun of the whole thing and make it marketable.’”

Music producer and engineer Evan Johnson owns the Timeless Studio in Cincinnati, where he said he has worked with a number of artists including City Girls, DaBaby, and Danny Glover. Johnson took issue with the robot’s use of the N-word in particular.

“It’s upsetting, obviously, whether it’s a bot, a person, artificial; it’s inappropriate,” he said. “Now people can get away with it, in a sense, because you can’t blame a person, you know?” he added. “You have to now blame…technology. That sucks. That’s gonna open up the door for so many similar issues.”

Ron “T.nava” Avant, a member of the Free Nationals with Anderson Paak, accused the company behind the rapping bot of appropriating Black culture not just for financial gain, but also for prestige.

“Like, white people always take Black people stuff, capitalize off of it, make it a big thing,” he told The Daily Beast, explaining how Elvis Presley became the King of Rock ’n Roll despite artists like Chuck Berry and Little Richard creating that pathway for him.

“They don’t give props to all the Black artists,” he continued. “The rap music game is not even Black anymore. The hip hop scene, it isn’t even hip hop anymore.”

Collin Édouard, an ethnomusicologist at Yale University, told The Daily Beast that Black cultural appropriation is more than just ripping off the music. He considered it an invasion of spirituality that makes him “uncomfortable.”

“Just like any Black form of spirituality, when it comes to music [it] is for the people or protest by the people,” he said. “It’s always been our way of expression. Giving it to a robot that creates algorithms is missing the soul and the spirituality of this Black reclamation project that we call hip hop. …This is just another attempt to suck the soul and life out of Blackness and Black spirituality.”

Édouard said it’s more than just the end product of music, but it’s the journey of creating it that makes it an artistic-spiritual experience. Artificial intelligence, he said, fails to grasp that complexity.

“Creating real music is a spiritual practice in itself, regardless of what kind of music you do,” he said.

“I have no fear that a robot can do what I can do when it comes to creating music—absolutely not. Plus, the things that I have inherited from my ancestors, it's not something that a robot is going to ever be able to download, upload, export, or import.”

By Wednesday afternoon, FN Meka’s TikTok and Instagram accounts had been removed.

Factory New did not immediately respond to The Daily Beast's request for comment Thursday.

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