New York Times reporter Matt Richtel, who also writes songs, set recordings of his own material against Suno-generated tracks and asked readers to pick the better ones. The piece ran around 3 October; Andy Revkin interviewed Richtel about it on 9 October.
“This was our cage match: carbon life-forms versus silicon chips, with you, the readers and audience as the ultimate judge.”
Matt Richtel, New York Times reporter, as quoted by Andy Revkin · revkin.substack.com ↗
The human versions took a weekend with four studio musicians. The AI side took about an hour and produced some 30 Suno songs, made five weeks later with Juliana Castro Varón, the paper's senior design editor for A.I. initiatives.
Video frame from the Revkin–Richtel conversation on the experiment
Image: Sustain What?
The Verge's writer found it barely a contest, with the AI songs poor and easy to tell apart. Revkin sees the exercise as more about creativity than man against machine. Outlets differ on headcount: The Verge says five musicians, Revkin four plus Richtel.
Richtel is a Pulitzer-winning reporter whose 2022 book Inspired deals with creativity.