The relatives of deceased musicians including rappers Tupac Shakur and XXXTentacion have offered their take on Rod Stewart’s controversial tribute to late rocker Ozzy Osbourne.
British star Stewart, 80, caused outrage among music fans with an AI-generated sequence aired at his Ameris Bank Amphitheater concert in Alpharetta, Georgia, on Friday 1 August.
The sequence in question showed an AI likeness of the Black Sabbath frontman gleefully posing for photos with a number of other stars who have died over the years, including Prince, Tina Turner, Bob Marley, Tupac, Michael Jackson, Freddie Mercury, Amy Winehouse, George Michael and Kurt Cobain.
Many critics on social media branded the video tasteless, disrespectful and offensive.
However, some relatives of the stars depicted have now said they are not concerned and even felt grateful towards Stewart for including their loved ones in the tribute.
Speaking to TMZ, Tupac’s stepbrother Mopreme Shakur said: “I’m pretty sure we all love Rod Stewart.
“I’m not sure about the legalities of it, but I have no problem with him memorialising the greats. Personally, I’m good with it.”
Hip-hop legend Tupac died in a still-unsolved drive-by shooting in Las Vegas, in 1996.
Meanwhile, XXXTentacion’s mother, Cleopatra Bernard said she was glad her son – who was fatally shot and killed, aged 20, during an armed robbery in 2018 – had made enough of an impact to be included.
At the time of writing, none of the other families or estates of the artists included have commented publicly. Stewart’s representatives did not respond to The Independent’s request for comment.
Mark Engelman, an intellectual property barrister, gave his view to The Times on the legalities of sharing AI-generated videos of deceased celebrities.
“There are a number of legal issues which arise from the inclusion of images of dead personalities of the likes of Prince, Tina Turner, Bob Marley and others in video clips,” he said.
“The most immediate is passing off, by false endorsement. The estates of the dead artists might well consider claims that even dead artists, like dead trademarks, retain a goodwill associated with their names and images which would otherwise benefit the estate, unless Rod Stewart obtained the licence of those images.
“Images of dead personalities are also protectable by image and personality right protection in numerous jurisdictions of the world, especially those registered in Guernsey, which actually possesses a register of those rights.”
Meanwhile, the blogger whose post from Stewart’s concert sent the AI video viral appeared to express her regret over the saga in a post to Substack.
“I shouldn’t have posted this video making fun of an old man trying to pay tribute to some of his friends,” Sloane Steel wrote.
“I’m sure he had no ill intent behind this. But AI is an insidious beast. And this kind of soulless maudlin slop is the most offensive form of AI ‘art’.”
However, she added the wry remark: “I can’t imagine why Ozzy would be visiting any of these people when a lot of his close friends like Randy Rhoads and Lemmy [Kilmister, of Motörhead] would presumably be waiting down below in the pits of hell ready to snap a quick selfie with him.”
She also pointed out that Prince in particular was vehemently opposed to virtual reality, even before the creation of holograms: “That whole virtual reality thing… is demonic,” he once said. “And I am not a demon.”
“I’m sure Rod will recover from this debacle and he’ll go on to make millions of dollars with a sweaty summer crotch in amphitheaters all over the world,” Steel concluded.
“And I’ll go back to being known as what one online publication called ‘a producer of brain rot content’. So in the end, Rod and I aren’t so different after all. But I make my own brain rot content, by hand, with love, the way my ancestors made it. And that’s the difference.”
Osbourne died aged 76 on 22 July. His official cause of death was recently disclosed, along with a touching tribute from his daughter, Aimée.
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