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In my ongoing crusade against the inevitability of artificial intelligence, both in my community and as an artist, it has been relieving to see the broad resistance that the public has to these tools and what is being made with them. Most people wouldn’t be caught dead listening to AI music on purpose. But those who stand to profit from AI slop will continue to find ways to fool the public into unintentionally consuming what the machine produces.

Enter Fenix Flexin. Once primarily known as a human member of Los Angeles rap group Shoreline Mafia, he is now riding high on the chart success of “RUBBERZ,” his AI-assisted collaboration with Purps On The Beat. Peaking at #58 on the Billboard Hot 100, the dispassionate warbling of the song’s “vocalist” using a stilted British accent makes T-Pain with AutoTune sound like Luther Vandross by comparison.

Much has been written about the ‘80s new wave direction of “RUBBERZ” and how it is such a massive departure for Flexin, who was previously known for trap music. Commenters on YouTube cite Morrissey and the Smiths as well as Grand Theft Auto: Vice City and Scarface as sonic touchstones (or in this case, AI data scraping targets). Part of what has piqued the audience’s curiosity is the ironic contrast of someone who looks like that “making” a song that sounds like this. But the closest comparison to me would be auto-tuned R&B diversions from the ‘00s like Snoop Dogg’s “Sensual Seduction.”

That song was very clear in its influences and was conceptually tight on every level. Snoop was totally committed to the bit and it seemed to call back to the types of songs that he might have sampled when he first hit the scene. Initially seen as a heretical embrace of AutoTune, “Sensual Seduction” has gone on to become fondly remembered and still burns down the club today.

Conversely, “RUBBERZ” is full of the insipid lyrics that have become AI music’s sonic signature: “Bankrolls on the table / Watching local cable.” The whole thing is played for yuks and you can’t envision Flexin’s brain coming up with it in the way that you might implicitly believe the provenance of art from true masters of the non-sequitur such as Lil B and RXKNephew. “RUBBERZ” is a rote list of rap signifiers and hood clichés over an annoyingly catchy boilerplate synthpop beat. True idiosyncrasy is absent here.

The initial strategy employed by everyone involved with “RUBBERZ” was to deny the AI allegations. But any look under the hood would undoubtedly show that this car was electric. Fenix Flexin posted the Pro Tools session online with stems for the song, but deleted it soon after commenters pointed out irregularities that suggested that the session was fabricated. Denying was the plan until they got exposed by house producer Medasin in a viral video where he used the AI app Treblo to generate similar lyrics and vocals to “RUBBERZ.”

Fenix’s initial refusal to admit that this obviously computerized tune was the product of AI would be funny if the implications for the music community at large weren’t so grim. He pulled up to On The Radar Radio, a hip-hop media channel known for airing off the cuff verses by rappers, and “performed” “RUBBERZ,” miming along to the track like a band on Top of the Pops in the ‘80s.

This was the same platform that hosted Drake and Central Cee for a landmark freestyle in 2023. It used to be a place where rappers came to prove their technical skill. Anyone watching Fenix Flexin here is only viewing it out of morbid curiosity, wondering whether or not he will (or can) perform the song with his real voice. The more we accept this slop as something worth hearing, the lower the bar goes for us all. AI has a corrosive effect on everything it touches, damaging the credibility of every previously established institution that goes on to legitimize it.

It has had the same effect on Fenix Flexin as an artist. Watching him rap along to “RUBBERZ” on Channel 5 with Andrew Callaghan using his regular nasal speaking voice while draped in the artifice of his Sunset Blvd hypebeast uniform, he doesn’t look cool at all. It’s wild to think that he’s gone from being part of Kendrick Lamar’s Pop Out concert to this.

More than anything, Fenix looks nervous and guilty. He starts talking with a British accent on the phone with noted AI booster Timbaland, as if to show that he does actually speak like that in his everyday life. When producer Purps On The Beat is interviewed in the same video, he smirks like a kid caught doing something naughty.

Just like how a college student who used ChatGPT to write their essay can’t tell you much about the subject afterwards, Fenix Flexin fumbles on camera and can’t even remember his puerile lyrics that he supposedly came up with. Even with the “All press is good press” approach to promoting this slop, “RUBBERZ” has fallen to #79 on the charts this week. We’ve entered the phase of the campaign where everyone admits that AI was used in this song, leading to the strategic deployment of this quote from Treblo co-founder Ryan Tremblay:

"Someone appears to have used our model to find a sound that millions of people connected with and that’s exciting."

“RUBBERZ” is a trial balloon for further AI incursions into pop, yet again testing the public’s tolerance for the technology. But this might be where the story ends for the “composition” in question. AI art relies on novelty and deception. They know that humans are repulsed by this technology, thus it has to be smuggled in and subsequently celebrated by bots in the comments and calculated press quotes.

Now that the jig is up, the eyeballs will go elsewhere and the song will be forgotten. No one will play it at their wedding or do it at karaoke. It won’t be the soundtrack to anyone’s life. It won’t inspire millions like the discography of the Smiths has. And as for Fenix Flexin, this will be his legacy and the end of his identity as an actual artist. Just like Barry Bonds and Mark McGwire with steroids, people who cheat to win don’t make it into the hall of fame.

Slop of the Pops

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