Photo Credit: Stefan Brending / CC by 3.0
After stories unfolded over the weekend of Avenged Sevenfold being dropped from the lineup of several music festivals, many fans wondered what’s up? Turns out the band’s communications channels were hacked.
A fake message posted to the group’s podcast on Spotify made the announcement. “Hey Trax listeners, we’re so sorry to bring bad news to you all, but I wanted you to hear it straight from the horse’s mouth. We’ve had some unexpected delays on the new album and have decided to cancel our appearances at Welcome to Rockville and Sonic Temple to focus on finishing it up. It breaks our heart to do this, but some things have to be done,” the message begins.
The only problem is that the message is fake. After news of the festival cancellations went viral, members of the band began to respond. “Literally walking in the streets of Mexico and listening to this. What the actual f*ck, NOT ME! This is NOT TRUE. We are still playing. Getting to the bottom of this,” says M. Shadows, whose voice was AI-generated to create the deepfake announcement.
“Our accounts were compromised over the weekend and have now been recovered. Our festival appearances have not been cancelled. For the time being, please go to our Discord for all future communications. Thank you for your patience,” the official Avenged Sevenfold Twitter account tweeted the next day.
The entire announcement released on the Trax podcast is an AI deepfake generated to sound like M. Shadows voice. “We want to thank you for your understanding and support during this time. Your dedication to our music and your unwavering enthusiasm for our shows inspire us every day,” the fake M. Shadows told very real fans. “We promise to make it up to you, and we will see you soon. Once again, we apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused, and we thank you for your patience and understanding.”