Australia's recorded music industry will exclude tracks created entirely by artificial intelligence from its official charts, a representative said on Tuesday, as rapidly expanding generative technologies put artists' livelihoods under pressure.

The move follows a prolonged controversy: a variation of Madonna's pop hit "Like a Prayer," produced by an Australian artist using AI-generated vocals and drums, has spent 16 weeks in the Australian top 20. The track peaked at number two on the Australian Record Industry Association's (ARIA) top 20 Australian singles chart in May and stood in fourth place on Tuesday, stoking debate over generative AI's place in music and how chart eligibility should account for machine-made elements.

Under the new policy, wholly AI-generated tracks will be barred from the ARIA charts from Monday next week, though some AI-assisted music will remain eligible, according to an ARIA statement. To qualify, a track must meet the condition that "humans wrote the song and performed the lead vocal and the primary instruments," among other requirements. AI-generated music will also be ineligible for the Australian industry's prestigious ARIA awards, drawing a clearer line between fully synthetic releases and works where human creative control remains central.

ARIA chief executive Annabelle Herd said: "These changes reflect our intent to remain dynamic and promote the human nature of artistry in what is — to say the least — a rapidly developing space."

"The ARIA Charts will always remain a transparent measurement of the music Australia consumes, but a chart that rewards unlicensed AI output would undercut the very basis of the recorded music we exist to represent," Herd added.

Eligible releases must also be produced using legal AI services. The requirement follows the appearance of music on streaming services that had apparently been developed with AI tools trained on artists' music without authorization, highlighting a separate rights question beyond chart placement.

Australia's rules are in step with new principles released in July by the London-based International Federation of the Phonographic Industry, the body that represents the recording industry worldwide. Those international guidelines state that, to qualify for official music charts, a track must be "substantially human made."

Alexis Weaver, a composer and lecturer at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music, told Australian Broadcasting Corp. that the debate around AI in music was "exceptionally fraught and very emotional for a lot of musicians and so everyone will have a different opinion."

Weaver applauded ARIA's move as a "wonderful step forward," saying it sent a message that ARIA wanted to "prioritize and value human creativity."

"It can be quite hard to avoid AI tools in the current landscape," Weaver said. "There is a way to use it while you're still steering the ship and making the main creative choices."

Source: Fortune