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Doja Cat Calls Tyga a ‘Penis’ Over AI Use on $TARFACE Album. He Fights Back

By Deborah Oladapo, on August 15, 2026

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When Doja Cat joined a livestream last Wednesday, she had something to say about Tyga. “Tyga is a penis for making an AI album,” she told viewers. No hedging. No qualifications.

Tyga, 36, responded the next day with a far narrower description of what happened in the studio. He confirmed that artificial intelligence had been involved in $TARFACE while disputing the sweeping label Doja Cat, 30, had attached to the project.

The timing is awkward for an industry still writing the rules as it goes. The U.S. Copyright Office has been studying generative AI and creative works since 2023, yet no ruling has addressed what disclosure artists owe audiences about AI’s role in production.

This exchange exposed a gap the music industry has not filled: what listeners are owed when AI contributes to a record, and who gets to decide.

When a Former Collaborator Says It, People Listen

Doja Cat’s criticism carries more weight than a random social-media callout because she and Tyga have an established professional history, one that put both of them on the charts.

Their 2019 “Juicy” remix peaked at No. 41 on the Billboard Hot 100, which Billboard notes was Doja Cat’s first entry on that chart. “Freaky Deaky” followed in 2022, reaching No. 43.

Shared credits make criticism hit with a different kind of thud. This was a peer with a real musical history beside him, not a stranger flinging a hot take into the feed and hoping the algorithm would do the rest.

Her opening line sharpened the effect: “Nobody asked me anything about Tyga, but I felt like saying this.” The unsolicited setup carried the air of a verdict.

What Tyga Actually Says the AI Did

Before the controversy reached its current pitch, Tyga gave a detailed account of his use of technology, confirming programs including Suno and describing the specific role they played.

He said he reached for those tools when he needed synths for particular songs, or a guitar solo “done ASAP.” His framing was practical: “As far as the writing, all the vocals are all me. There’s nothing wrong with using technology as a tool.” The project also involved three months of studio time.

On VIBE Live, Tyga reached for a comparison every pop listener understands: “It’s no different than when AutoTune came out. Some people were opposed to it, but real artists took it and used it.”

The parallel has some merit. Both technologies arrived amid skepticism and were eventually absorbed into standard practice. Still, the mechanics differ: Auto-Tune processes a performer’s recorded voice, while what Tyga describes involves AI generating instrumental material from scratch, without a human playing the notes first.

The Sound He Was Chasing and Why He Needed Help Getting There

$TARFACE was built around a specific aesthetic goal, and understanding what Tyga wanted explains the production approach better than the controversy has.

He also told Vibe he had been obsessed with the 1980s for years, and the project carried personal weight: music his mother played at home before her death. Working on the album “connected me to my mother,” he said, and gave him “a lust for life again after losing my mom.”

His references were Prince, Michael Jackson, Hall & Oates, Rick James, the Police, Tom Petty, Lisa Lisa, plus Scarface, Moonwalker, and Purple Rain, reportedly kept in rotation for two months straight while recording. His target was “futuristic ’80s,” filtered and crunchy in ways that felt period-specific.

Reaching that texture quickly, without era-fluent session musicians or vintage hardware, is exactly where these tools can close a gap. He has also framed $TARFACE as separate from the music brand he has maintained for more than 15 years: “This character, $TARFACE, is a completely separate artist, completely separate aesthetic and everything.”

What Nobody Outside the Studio Can Verify

Image Credit: VitalikRadko via Depositphotos

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The details most relevant to forming an independent opinion about $TARFACE remain undisclosed, and Tyga’s statements have not filled the gap.

Which tracks contain AI-generated material? How much of what was generated was retained versus reworked? What training data did the tools draw from? Pitchfork gave $TARFACE a score of 0 out of 10, publishing a blistering review that lambasted the album’s reliance on generative tools as “slop-pop.”

His reply managed to turn a brutal review into a punchline: “I don’t really know what Pitchfork is. All I know is the devil uses a pitchfork.” Oh well!

Tyga described the project as “an experiment” during his Live appearance and said he has not decided whether to use AI again. Those comments clarify how he views the process, but they still do not show how extensively the technology shaped the finished record.

Why This Argument Will Keep Happening

Tyga is not the only artist navigating this version of the authenticity question, which shows the confusion runs deeper than any single album.

Shoreline Mafia’s Fenix Flexin drew similar scrutiny over his 1980s-influenced song “RUBBERZ.” He initially denied AI involvement, then acknowledged in an Instagram comment that AI had been used but “had nun to do [with] the recording process.”

The language nearly mirrors Tyga’s: AI presented as a limited tool, distinct from authorship. That similarity matters because it shows artists are already reaching for the same distinction while audiences still decide whether to accept it.

Until the industry develops a common way to describe those production choices, each release can become its own tiny courtroom, complete with arguments over tools, authorship, and where one stops counting as the other.

When an artist uses AI to create instrumental elements but writes and performs everything else, what would you want to know before deciding how you feel about the music?

 

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