An artist who doesn’t exist is making waves in the global music industry with many flocking to buy these hits.

This week, tracks released under the name Eddie Dalton, a fully AI-generated musician, climbed to the top of the iTunes charts across multiple countries, including Australia, the US and parts of Europe.

Three songs in the top five are Another Day Old, Running to You and Cheap Red Wine.

The music is believed to be distributed by a company known as Crusty Tunes, and is part of a growing wave of AI-generated content entering commercial music platforms.

But the success of AI-generated music is fuelling debate within the industry, as it challenges traditional ideas of authorship, authenticity and creative ownership, while proving it can compete commercially on a global scale.