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The Beatles' Now and Then Scripts Grammy History As First Ever AI-Assisted Song To Earn Nominations; Fans React
The Beatles earns historic Grammy nods for Record of the Year and Best Rock Performance with the AI-assisted song Now and Then that revives John Lennon’s voice from a 1970s demo.
Now and Then by the most popular rock band, The Beatles, makes history as the first AI-assisted song to be nominated for a Grammy award. It has been nominated for Record of the Year and Best Rock Performance at the 2025 Grammy Awards. This song was released in November 2023 as a single and was promoted widely as it was finished via AI, which generated a lot of interest and comments.
Early commentary indicated that generative AI may have been necessary in the ‘recreation’ of the voice of the deceased band member, John Lennon. However, that wasn't the case. According to Billboard, AI was used only for ‘stem separation’, which resulted in Lennon’s vocal recordings from a 1970s demo being rescued. Background noise was removed, and his voice could be retained in the final recording.
Stem separation allowed them to increase the volume of Lennon’s vocals without any distortion. This method not only kept the core of the original recording intact but also illustrated the extent to which AI could be useful in helping to bring back ancient recordings to life.
Now and Then is the first of the last Beatles songs to be nominated for the Grammy Award in years, which happens to be their fourth nomination in the Record of the Year category. The Beatles have, however, not won in this category in the past.
The cleaning of Lennon’s demo through the use of AI has received a polarizing response. A user on social media claimed, "Everything is fine with The Beatles... But this Grammy nomination is quite forced. "
However, another fan was quick to argue, "The Beatles DID NOT USE AI to create a song but rather to isolate John Lennon’s voice from a record that already existed and recorded new parts in a traditional way. winning the Grammy would be the least they could do for the last song made by the greatest band of all time."
Touted as “the last Beatles song”, the track has guitar overdubs made by George Harrison in 1995 alongside Lennon's vocals. However, neither Lennon nor Harrison qualified for the Grammy Award, as their contributions to the track were not newly made since the two passed away in 1980 and 2001, respectively.
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