GasLab (Generative AI Solutions Lab), a generative AI music platform founded by DJ and music producer Reinier Zonneveld, has launched with $1 million in pre-seed funding.
The company aims to protect artists and other music creators as AI-generated music becomes more popular. Its goal is to make sure artists whose music is used to train AI systems receive proper credit and a share of the value their work helps create.
The funding round attracted investors including Eric Demuth, co-founder and executive chairman of Bitpanda, and Bas Beerens, founder of WeTransfer, along with other European entrepreneurs.
GasLab offers a system that allows artists and record labels to permit the use of their music to train its AI models. The platform tracks how their music influences each AI-generated track and ensures they are paid for their contributions.
Its technology is designed to make AI music creation more transparent and fair. Users can see which songs and artists have influenced the music they generate.
Zonneveld began learning classical piano at the age of three before teaching himself electronic music production. He founded the Filth on Acid record label in 2017, holds the world record for the longest electronic music live set, and has consistently ranked among the world’s top 30 DJs over the past five years.
Zonneveld and his long-time friend and business partner, Cas Luuring, began exploring machine learning eight years ago. Their work led to the development of Zonneveld’s own AI model, R2, which was trained on his music catalogue. He now performs alongside the AI model at music festivals.
Reinier Zonneveld, Co-founder, mil, said: “My academic background in economics and mathematics fuelled a curiosity for what algorithms could bring to music. But first and foremost I am a musician and I believe it must always pay to be an artist. The current state of generative AI has a major flaw: It takes from artists but gives nothing back. This is a problem that has to be solved if we want there to be any semblance of a creative industry in the future. So, I set out to solve it. And that’s how we came up with GasLab.”
The funding will help GasLab develop its platform and move closer to its goal of becoming a leading global AI music platform that gives artists proper credit and fair payment. The company also aims to make its technology available to other AI platforms to help them track and credit the music used in AI-generated content.
Reinier Zonneveld is inviting people interested in creating music with GasLab to sign up for private testing invites before the platform becomes publicly available. Musicians, record labels and other music rights holders can also contact the team to learn more about the platform and how they can become part of the initiative.
