What happens when AI starts rewriting the rules of the music industry?

This week on The Artist Economy, Michael Walker, Chris Saunders, Sol Gold, and Devin Mooers break down the biggest stories shaping the future of independent artists. We dive into prediction markets manipulating Spotify charts, the multi-billion-dollar rise of AI music company Suno, the legal battle over AI training data, the collapse of the traditional touring ladder, and why governments are now treating frontier AI models like strategic technology.

Along the way we ask bigger questions:

• Who really owns music once it becomes culture?

• Can AI companies profit from music they didn't create?

• Why are artists still chasing streams instead of owning relationships?

• What happens when every algorithm becomes a game?

• Is AI replacing artists... or forcing them to become more human?

If you're trying to build a sustainable music career over the next decade, this conversation is about much more than headlines—it's about understanding where the industry is going before everyone else does.

In this episode, Michael, Chris, Sol, and Devin unpack the forces reshaping music, technology, and the economics of being an independent artist—and what these changes could mean for the future of creativity, ownership, and artist careers.

Key Takeaways

• How prediction markets created incentives to manipulate Spotify's charts—and what that teaches us about every algorithm.

• Why Suno's $5.4 billion valuation changes the conversation around AI music forever.

• The legal battle over AI training data, copyright, and who should benefit from the next generation of music technology.

• Why millions of songs being used to train AI may become one of the defining copyright questions of our generation.

• "Blue Dot Fever" and what shrinking concert attendance means for the future of touring.

• Why governments briefly treated frontier AI models like strategic national assets—and why artists should care.