“If people want to climb the mountain, I guess you use the tools you can to get up there”: Mac DeMarco’s real feelings on musicians using AI in their workAI may be creeping into every corner of the music industry, but don’t expect Mac DeMarco to be outsourcing his songwriting to a machine anytime soon.
The Canadian singer-songwriter speaks in a new interview with The Independent, where he discusses the making of his upcoming album Guitar and why, for him, the human element in music will always outweigh any technological shortcut.

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“We’re in a funny zone right now where AI is coming in and getting good at things, fast,” he says. “Things start feeling paint-by-numbers sometimes. When you have AI bands coming around, and people listening to music without even realising it’s AI-generated, we’re in a weird place.”
And the 35-year-old isn’t exaggerating – earlier this year, a fictional band called The Velvet Sundown made headlines after racking up hundreds of thousands of monthly Spotify listeners just weeks after forming. Its music was later revealed to be entirely AI-generated (using Suno), including the band members, promotional images, and backstory.
For DeMarco, the trend strikes at the heart of what makes music meaningful. Watching younger musicians skip the grind of touring is already painful enough but the idea that some might not even want to write their own material? That crosses a line.
“I hear about people using AI to even write lyrics a lot nowadays, which is a bit like… give me a fucking break,” he says. “I think it’s about intention. If people want to climb the mountain, I guess you use the tools you can to get up there. I don’t know what you’re gonna find when you get up there, but hopefully you’re happy.”
That belief also informs his own creative process. DeMarco’s upcoming album Guitar, out 22 August, was completed in just a couple of weeks and is made entirely of unpolished “demo recordings”.
“There’s a satisfaction I have with this kind of thing, because of how pure and real it feels to me,” he says of the record. “It’s supremely of me. The most important part of art is the human element, I think. Be it good or bad, that’s what I want to hear.”
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