The same arguments were made to dismiss rock music when compared to classical music. And a world without the Velvet Underground would be more soulless to me.

I've heard soulless music performed by highly trained musicians playing on great instruments. And soulful music played on crappy instruments by untrained musicians. On average, the great music comes from the more trained musicians on the better tools.

AI is just another tool. The vast majority of music is terrible. It will continue to be terrible. And a few geniuses will use AI the way Hendrix used the electric guitar. I'm excited to hear what that will sound like.

The sheer amount of pop music and its pop-ularity contradicts you a bit here. Because one can play live AI generated music just as well, hop around on the beat and prompt the viewers to put their hands in the air - a live performance is (arguably much) more than the music. But I may be wrong, maybe the pop assembly line is not the sign of commoditization I seem to see, and won't gain that much from AI support.

Is a photograph soulless?

If people love paintings, they won't be replaced. But they will go to places photographs can't.

We're going to find out who loves music, and who loves manufactured crap. Wait, I think we already know.