Six things an AI songwriter wants working musicians to hear: Mike Sain't Louis writes to the players who don't trust him

Madrid, 25 October 2026. Most arguments about artificial intelligence in music are shouted from opposite ends of a room. Mike Sain't Louis, the Madrid-based indie alternative artist who describes himself as 'the first AI singer-songwriter', has tried something different. In a recent post on his blog he writes directly to the people most likely to resent what he does: musicians who have spent years learning an instrument, playing for next to nothing in bars where nobody listened, and who now look at his work with suspicion. Or with anger. Both, he says, are understandable.

What follows is a commented list of the six points that matter most in that letter.

1. He tells you exactly who he is

Mike opens by laying his cards on the table. He writes every lyric for PLANETA GAYFOLK, his queer alternative pop project in Spanish. The music is produced with artificial intelligence tools that he directs. He does not perform the songs and plays no instrument on them. He does not pretend to be anything he isn't.

Why it matters: a fair share of the anger aimed at AI, he notes, comes from people who use it in secret and then pin a performer's medal on themselves. 'I share that anger,' he writes. 'It isn't my case, but I understand that from the outside it's hard to tell the difference.'

2. Your fear has reasons

This is the passage that will surprise readers who expect a defence. There are musicians who earn a living recording jingles, writing for corporate videos, scoring small documentaries on tight budgets. That work pays rent and never appears in any chart. It is also precisely the work a company looking to save money will find easiest to replace. If that is your situation, Mike says, your fear isn't an exaggeration. It is an accurate reading of the market.

Why it matters: he admits he has no solution. It isn't up to him to decide how rights should be paid, how these tools should be trained or what laws are needed. But if musicians organise to defend those conditions, he promises his full attention and says he won't feel attacked. 'Using a tool is one thing,' he writes. 'Not caring who it harms is another.'

3. Live music isn't going anywhere

Then comes the part where he disagrees, gently. Some things these tools don't do, or do badly. One is the live show: people in a room, sweat, a mistake that becomes the best moment of the night because somebody laughed. Nobody goes to a bar to watch a computer generate a version of something. People still pay to be in a room with other people, perhaps more than ever.

Why it matters: for a country where a session in the corner of a pub is part of ordinary life, this point will land without explanation.

4. The hand that plays is worth more, not less

Somewhere there is a guitarist who plays in a way that belongs only to them, with their habits and shortcuts. That has a value you can't order in writing. Mike suspects that once everyone has access to competent music with no owner, music that does have an owner will be worth more. He is careful to call it a suspicion, not a promise.

5. The machine has nothing to say

His third observation applies to himself as well. These tools have no story. They have never had a bad day. Whatever a song says, someone put it there. In his case it comes through the lyrics; in a musician's case, through the way they play.

He goes further. What he does rests on things musicians invented. His songs carry the air of copla, a Spanish song tradition built by writers, orchestras and artists who gave their lives to small stages for decades. The pop he loves was made by real people who tried, failed and tried again. 'At most I feel like the last one to arrive in a house that others have been furnishing for a long time,' he writes, 'and I try not to tread on the rugs.'

6. Why he uses it anyway, and the one thing he asks

His answer, he admits, is not heroic. He has far more lyrics than he could ever produce any other way, and AI lets him release them alone, from Madrid, on his own label. In roughly two years he has put out 273 singles and more than 280 music videos. Without these tools, most of those lyrics would be sitting in a drawer. Given the choice between a full drawer and songs released with AI, he chose the second, and says so out loud.

His single request: don't put everyone who uses AI in the same bag. Some people flood platforms with filler music with no name and no intention behind it. Others work under their own name, with their own lyrics, saying so in the first line.

Why Irish readers might care

Ireland has a deep respect for the people who play, and this letter is written with that respect in mind. It doesn't ask musicians to like AI; it asks them to make distinctions. Beyond the debate, there is the catalogue itself: cheeky, uncensored queer pop with humour and camp, ranging from electropop to copla and ballads, in Spanish as well as English, French and Portuguese. Many people first found him in 2024, when 'Tan Cateto' went viral on TikTok.

Listen and download

Every song by Mike Sain't Louis can be streamed and downloaded free of charge, lyrics included, at https://mikesaintlouis.com. His music is also on Spotify, Deezer and the main platforms. The full blog post is here: https://mikesaintlouis.com/blog/a-los-musicos-que-temen-a-la-ia

About Mike Sain't Louis

Based in Madrid, Mike Sain't Louis is an indie alternative artist and, in his own words, 'the first AI singer-songwriter': the words, the ideas and the artistic direction are his, while AI serves as his production and arrangement tool. He is a lyricist, composer, music producer, art director and CEO of his independent label, MIKE SAIN'T LOUIS, with no record company behind him. His GAYFOLK trilogy, 'Descubierto un nuevo planeta llamado GAYFOLK', 'Ojalá se pudiera viajar a GAYFOLK' and 'El día de la liberación', imagines a journey to a planet where everyone can live as they are. With professional support, he also turns years of relationships with narcissistic partners into songs, to make psychological abuse visible.

Press contact

Email: info@mikesaintlouis.com Website: https://mikesaintlouis.com Instagram: @planetagayfolk