Elvis Presley and Eminem Rights Holders Sue Suno Over AI Training and Voice Imitation

The complaints were filed on November 6 in the US District Court for the Northern District of California, according to reports of the filings. The Presley suit is one of the first major cases brought under Tennessee's Ensuring Likeness Voice and Image Security Act, known as the ELVIS Act. The state passed the law in 2024 to protect a person's voice and likeness from unauthorised use through artificial intelligence. Most suits against AI music companies so far have centred on whether training on recordings and compositions is copyright infringement. The Presley case also asks whether an AI system that can reproduce a recognisable singer's voice breaks publicity law, which could expose Suno to claims from artists and estates as well as from labels and publishers.

The Presley plaintiffs include Authentic Brands Group and Raleigh Music Publishing. Their 51-page complaint alleges that Suno lets users get music resembling Presley's vocals by naming him in prompts, and that the company exploits his identity in doing so. Reports of the filing say it accuses Suno of copying 859 Presley compositions to train its models. "The next Elvis won't pick up a guitar," the complaint says.

Eight Mile Style, which controls the publishing rights to hundreds of Eminem compositions, filed a separate copyright case. Eminem is not a plaintiff. The publisher alleges that Suno used Eminem's songs and lyrics for training without permission and that users can generate tracks imitating his work. Its complaint cites "Lose Yourself", "Without Me" and "The Real Slim Shady" and includes AI-generated examples that it says reproduce elements of his lyrics and vocal style. According to reports of the filing, Eight Mile Style is seeking more than $41 million. That figure is $150,000 for each of 269 songs, the maximum statutory damages for wilful infringement, plus about $672,000 over the alleged removal of copyright management information.

Both complaints take aim at Suno's main safeguard. The company blocks prompts that name specific artists, but Eight Mile Style says those guardrails are easily bypassed.

"Suno exists to help people create new, original music, not to trade on anyone's name or likeness," a Suno spokesperson said in a statement reported by Music Ally. The spokesperson also said the company works with third-party providers to screen uploaded audio and lyrics for misuse. In earlier cases, Suno has argued that training its models on copyrighted music is fair use. It has not yet filed a formal response to either new suit.

The lawyers bringing the cases include Richard Busch, who Music Ally said is among the most active attorneys pursuing music-industry claims against AI companies. Both plaintiffs have sued other AI companies before. The Presley rights holders recently sued Anthropic, alleging that it used 274 songs to train its Claude models, and Eight Mile Style has a separate copyright case against Meta.

Suno is already defending several other cases. Warner Music Group settled its claims and signed a licensing partnership with the company in November 2025. Universal Music Group and Sony Music Entertainment have not settled, and in September they filed a new suit arguing that Suno's licensed v6 model is tainted by its earlier, unlicensed models. In September, a group of musicians including Jason Isbell also brought a class action over the use of artists' names and likenesses. In Germany, a Munich court ruled on July 31 that Suno had infringed copyright by training on songs from the repertoire of the collecting society GEMA.

Investors have kept backing the company despite the lawsuits. Suno raised $400 million at a $5.4 billion valuation in June, according to reports at the time. None of the claims in the new suits has been tested in court.