Pro-war pop icon Shaman released a new music video on Thursday that uses AI-generated deepfakes to draft exiled Kremlin critics into his personal backing choir.
The video for the song “Mother Russia” opens with Shaman answering a question originally posed by exiled YouTuber Yury Dud: “What is Russia for you?” Shaman looks at the camera and says: “For me, Russia is a mother you cannot betray.”
Shaman spends the video playing a brooding intelligence operative reviewing dissident case files in a dimly lit office. He spreads out photos of rappers Morgenshtern, Noize MC and Oxxxymiron, alongside dozens of other “foreign agents,” like exiled journalists, political analysts and businessmen Mikhail Khodorkovsky and Oleg Tinkov.
Shaman then lifts his hands like an orchestra conductor, cutting to the photographs as the AI-animated dissidents sing out the chorus in unison: “Mother Russia, you’re in my heart, you’re the only one, with you until the end.”
A description accompanying the video claims “foreign agents” are paid to oppose Russia. “But in my music video, they’re singing for Russia completely free of charge,” Shaman writes in the description.
The music video’s closing scene takes a dark turn, showing a sniper-style laser sight targeting Shaman’s forehead.
Shaman, whose real name is Yaroslav Dronov, has become a symbol of wartime nationalism in Russia with hits such as “Ya Russky” (“I’m Russian”) and “Moi Boy” (“My Fight”).
The European Union, Canada and Australia have all introduced a no-entry ban for Shaman due to his outspoken support for the full-scale invasion of Ukraine. The EU ban prompted YouTube and Spotify to take down the singer’s accounts on their platforms.
More than 1,000 individuals, organizations and news outlets, including The Moscow Times, have been branded “foreign agents” since Russia first introduced the designation in 2012.
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