Tory Lanez Sues California Prison System for $100M Over Stabbing by Inmate D4vd Arrested for Alleged Murder of Celeste Rivas, Months After Body Found in Singer's Car Specifically, the contract granted the label the “unlimited, exclusive rights” for the company to “use the recording in models and systems of generative artificial intelligence and applications based thereon, including generative AI, including [but] not limited to the analysis of the Recording for the purpose of extracting information on patterns, trends and correlations (AI training).” Hession pushed back on this provision, and the two parties ultimately reached a compromise, giving Hession’s client some approval rights for the use of his recording in AI training. Crucially, though, these approval rights do not extend to any “blanket license” that Sony may sign to grant another party access to “all or a significant portion” of its catalog.

Hession’s experience was not an isolated incident. Instead, sources tell Billboard it is part of a growing new trend in music dealmaking where labels are trying to accumulate AI training rights — either through explicit new contract language or novel applications of long-standing licensing provisions. B1 Recordings, for example, included near-identical wording in a different artist single agreement this past November, according to a U.S.-based artist attorney.

French music giant Believe put a provision in an October 2025 distribution contract which allows it to license their content in datasets to “research, train, develop [and] test gen AI models and/or products.” In a BMG distribution deal, obtained by Billboard via a European music executive and translated from German, the contract phrasing mentions AI in multiple contexts. This includes an “AI Right,” which refers to the right to use songs created during the contract term in whole or in part in connection with artificial intelligence systems, “in particular to feed the contractual products into an AI system as training, validation or test datasets” and to “exploit the output generated by the AI system.” That last contract also forbids the artist to turn in AI-manipulated or AI-generated tracks as part of the delivery requirement for the BMG deal; prohibits the creation of re-recordings (like Taylor Swift’s), including re-records that use AI to deepfake or otherwise simulate the artist’s voice; and grants BMG the right of adaptation — meaning remixes, sampling or other modifications, including those that use AI — and to exploit those adaptations.

The addition of these novel contractual provisions around AI training and AI use in general appear to have coincided with the music industry’s move towards partnering with the new wave of AI music startups in recent months and settling parts of their lawsuits against them. In the fall, Universal Music Group (UMG) and Warner Music Group (WMG) both settled their claims in the blockbuster copyright infringement lawsuit against AI music company Udio and entered into licensing deals to “[create] new revenue streams for artists and songwriters, while ensuring their work remains protected,” as a press release about Warner’s deal stated.

Kobalt and Merlin followed suit with Udio deals months later. Related What Do the Suno and Udio Licensing Deals Mean for the Future of AI Music? In December, WMG followed up with a settlement and licensing agreement with Suno, which had also been hit with a near-identical copyright infringement lawsuit to Udio’s. (Sony Music, the other major music company who sued Suno and Udio along with UMG and WMG, has not yet announced any deals with the two firms and remains in active litigation.) In these settlement announcements, music companies have made a point to state that these deals ensure artists’ work is licensed and authorized.

The natural result is that AI training has now become an element of record deal negotiations — and sometimes a significant pain point. At times, this comes in the form of labels and distributors drafting clear language that grants them the right to use content for AI training, as in the case of the European deals identified by Billboard. Talent lawyer Avi Dahan says he’s been presented with this kind of provision in some recent contracts, though there “isn’t necessarily an industry norm yet around these points.” Dahan describes the current dealmaking landscape as the “Wild West” — a transition period where it’s becoming common practice for labels to require the disclosure of AI used to create