He was a Birmingham teenager obsessed with 90s girl groups like Destiny’s Child, Spice Girls, Sugababes and All Saints.
But the 15-year-old Craig Raybould could never have known that his dream of creating his own all-female act would become – virtual – reality decades later.
Because Craig, now 43, has taken advantage of the AI revolution to put together his own band – with a guarantee of no acrimonious splits or “artistic differences”.
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Certain Call is his virtual R&B group, featuring the fictional quartet of Tahlia, Imani, Sierra and Maya. Now they have more than two million YouTube subscribers.
Craig used song lyrics he wrote as a teenager and allowed technology to create the musical side for him.
Craig Raybould, the creator of Certain Call(Image: Craig Raybould)
Using music generator Suno, he made song created by typing in prompts to produce pianos, drums, vocals and more.
He then uses more tech to mix and master his tracks, removing errors and enhancing sound quality.
Last year, Craig released ‘Here We Go’, his 14-track debut album which consisted of lyrics from the family loft.
He said: “The project has always been transparent about how the music is made. Every video is labelled as AI-created, the members are openly fictional characters, and I remain publicly identified as the human songwriter and creator behind the group.
“The response has gone far beyond anything I imagined when I was writing lyrics as a teenager in Birmingham. Certain Call passed 100,000 YouTube subscribers in January and now has more than two million, with a large audience across Asia and Africa.
“The technology itself has evolved dramatically too. In summer 2025 I struggled to keep the four members’ faces consistent between images. Today I am creating full photorealistic music videos with increasingly convincing movement, expression and lip-sync.
“For me, the strange part is that songs that began in teenage notebooks in Birmingham nearly 30 years ago are finally reaching an audience of millions because a technology that did not exist when I wrote them eventually gave me a way to realise them.”
“I’m not sure where it could go with Certain Call, they could split up and have solo careers.”(Image: Certain Call)
Craig told BirminghamLive: “I’ve essentially created characters and personalities for the members, like something you would see in books and animation and hopefully people see someone they can relate to.
“There’s Tahlia who I have as the fierce frontwoman. She has red hair, is tall and a bit more confident than the others. There’s Imani who has long dark hair and is more glamorous and a bit more demure.
“Sierra is the blonde who is more like the wild edgy girl that has a different style. And then there’s Maya who is the sweeter one who I try and represent as the heart of the group that keeps them together.
“I think I will keep them at a similar age rather than make them older in the future. I’m not pretending they’re real, they are who they are.
“I’m not sure where it could go with Certain Call, they could split and have solo careers. I’m essentially managing them as if I have my own girl band and treating it like they have their own brand.”
Having previously worked in the academic publishing industry, Craig is ‘taking time out’ to focus on Certain Call.
Raybould spends hours creating music videos on AI programs and considers himself a director of the group(Image: Certain Call)
He said: “It’s weird seeing friends sing to my lyrics and the girl band have been on radio stations. I never really expected this, it’s amazing people are listening to my songs.
“With the various online subscription fees, this is still costing me more than I make from it.
“One of the difficult things with YouTube is that it’s about the number of hours watched, a three-minute video is not an hour-long episode.
“Spotify won’t add AI music to its official playlists so there’s less likelihood the music gets heard without an audience there. That’s the same across most streaming platforms.”
Artificial intelligence and music is a controversial topic in the music the industry, given the minimal work on production. But Craig said feedback had been ‘mostly supportive’ and it allowed him to release songs which were decades in the making.
He said: “I get that everyone has different opinions. If that’s your opinion, fair enough.
“For me, I think it is still something very creative as these songs wouldn’t have existed for me otherwise.
“It’s mostly been supportive feedback and a number of friends encouraged me to release the music. Around me, it’s very supportive and people seem open to it, I haven’t really faced much negative backlash.”
