BARELY ALIVE are not letting the robots take brostep without a fight.Ad 0:00 Click for sound 0:00 / 0:00 The veteran bass music duo is back with 100% NO AI, a seven-track EP that doubles as a no-holds-barred reminder of why their sound became so recognizable in the first place.
Out today via BARELY ALIVE’s Killed It! Recs, the project rejects the insidious growth of AI-generated music while pushing their retro-futuristic dubstep into a sharper modern form.The project is timely because AI-generated songs are no longer a distant concern for the music industry.
Deezer said earlier this year that its platform receives nearly 75,000 AI-generated tracks per day, amounting to roughly 44% of daily uploads, and an estimated $4.6 billion in annual artist revenue could be lost to AI-generated music by 2028, according to a recent economic study conducted by CISAC and PMP Strategy.Against that backdrop, 100% NO AI plants its flag clearly.
Every part of the EP, from its artwork to its vocals and production, was developed by humans, which is sadly a radical concept in 2026.BARELY ALIVE are not stamping a slogan onto a batch of tracks, but rather making a case for the kind of human authorship that can still be heard in specific choices: the vocalists, the collaborators, the odd textures, and the moments where melody and intensity fight for space inside the same drop.
The project opens with ‘OVERDRIVE,’ a solo production that begins with an angelic vocal before quickly snapping into a more aggressive dubstep drop.The sound-design is pure BARELY ALIVE with squealing synths, bass growls and high-energy movement.
‘POINT BLANK,’ with Edison Cole and Dani King, gives the EP one of its more melodic vocal-driven moments before twisting into a polished melodic dubstep banger.‘WE SET IT’ pulls the project into darker territory, pairing the ageless vocals of veteran duo Ragga Twins with a heavier ...