It only takes a cursory look at YouTube viewership trends across 2023 to discover the phenomenon of AI covers. Streamer Johnathan ‘jschlatt’ Schlatt has sensationally decided to fight back with a genuine cover of Frank Sinatra’s ‘My Way,’ released Dec. 15, so good that it defies belief.
The song accompanied a video titled ‘This NEEDS to stop’ on jschlatt’s live channel, in which Schlatt explained himself. “About six months ago, these covers started popping up out of nowhere,” he began. “But soon after that, something changed. It stopped being people’s favorite artists…it started being Spongebob, and Squidward, and Mr. Krabs, and me.” He’s not wrong. Type in ‘jschlatt AI cover’ into YouTube’s search engine, and you will be greeted with a playlist of nearly 150 songs.
One of these covers is of ‘My Way’, as made famous by fellow New Yorker Frank Sinatra in 1969. The gauntlet had effectively been laid, and fair play to Jschlatt, he picked it up and ran with it. Uploaded to his second channel, this version is so authentic that you can tell when his mic is just about hanging on in there for the big notes. And the craziest thing is that it’s brilliant.
“Schlatt unironically has a beautiful singing voice and that terrifies me,” said one comment. “This is an absolutely wonderful cover,” said another, “you should be very proud of yourself.” As an ex-choir boy myself, I could not agree more. There are certainly elements of Jschlatt’s performance that give away his lack of vocal experience, yet it is a thoroughly enjoyable listen. The man joked that he had originally planned to do an entire album, but perhaps he should reconsider, given how well this first song is being received.
It might have been put together purely as a piece of content, something aimed to generate clicks and laughs, but I think this streamer might have accidentally created one of the best arguments against AI to date.
