“Borders are opening…prices are soaring”: rising rapper found to be AI propaganda tool

By Anushri Sood 

A popular British rapper singing white nationalist and anti-immigration lyrics has been exposed as entirely AI, with one of its creators receiving funding from far-right group Advance UK. The revelation comes as experts warn that AI music is being used to radicalise people online.

The artist goes by the name of Danny Bones and has racist songs condemning migration to the UK, with strong anti-Islam sentiment and the use of antisemitic tropes permeating his music. His album Slopaganda, released in June 2026, includes songs such as ‘This is England’ which blames immigration for rising costs and increased crime. 

Bones has also released singles like ‘Traitors Freestyle’ where, cloaked in a British flag, he raps: “it’s coz of you fucking pricks why there’s even more divide,” referring to the growing number of immigrants. One track includes the lyrics: “An Asian nation will rise if we don’t find Christ,” and in another the AI rapper asks whether the world is “ran by Jews or master masons”.

Within a year, Bones has amassed one million followers on Instagram and his music has over a million streams on Spotify, with some songs being viewed up to half a million times on YouTube.

The men behind the rapper were revealed to be music producer Denver Bamber and 3D artist Theo Blackledge, according to an investigation by The Bureau of Investigative Journalism (TBIJ), a nonprofit news organisation based in London, and progressive independent media outlet Novara. UK-based Bamber and Blackledge founded The Node Project, the music company that created Danny Bones. 

The Node Project claims that it is “completely independent,” but Bamber has received funding from former far-right political party Advance UK. 

Earlier this year, he received £4000 ($7560 AU) from Advance UK for work creating a campaign video for a by-election. Although Bamber told Novara Media the payment was “separate creative work,” not connected to The Node Project, Danny Bones has appeared at far-right political events including a Tommy Robinson rally.

In Australia, Advance shares similar nationalist and anti-immigration messaging; however, it operates as a separate entity and was never a registered political party, unlike Advance UK. 

Locally, it’s a right-wing lobby group that seeks to ‘restore’ “the Australian way of life.”

The group has been backed by influential Australians, with records showing $895,000 in funding from mining magnate Gina Rinehart and a $50,000 donation from the husband of Jillian Segal, Special Envoy for Combating Antisemitism. Plymouth Brethren Christian Church, the secretive Christian sect formerly known as Exclusive Brethren, also poured $655,000 into Advance. 

Advance Australia hasn't published AI music, but it has generated racist images, and AI-generated propaganda is rife on alt-right social media pages and websites in Australia.

Following the investigation by TBIJ and Novara, ‘Danny Bones’ released a video labelling the articles “hit pieces calling us far-right.” An odd choice given the rapper’s declarations of white supremacy in his own songs, saying “I’m far right, far right of all this bullshit divide…I see a nation that’s died, I see erasure of whites.”

Stemming from the hip-hop cultural movement, rap music began in the early 1970s on the streets of New York City as a form of anti-institutional, anti-establishment dissent by African-Americans. By blaming immigrants for the declining prosperity of the white middle class, Bones has appropriated a style of music that is deeply rooted in African-American history and resistance.

Like Australia, far-right politics in the UK is gaining popularity with Reform UK. Led by Nigel Farage, whose policies include “stop[ping] the boats, scrap[ping] net zero, defend[ing] and protect[ing] British culture and traditions and rebuild[ing] British armed forces.”

Both countries are grappling with the use of artificial intelligence to promote far-right messaging, including a recent ABC investigation that found Pauline Hanson “engaging in acts of altruism” in images generated by AI and published on pages posing as news websites. 

A report from the Global Network on Extremism and Technology titled

“Melodies of Malice” has been monitoring the steady rise of AI “propaganda music” gaining popularity since 2023, a technique experts describe as “strategic mainstreaming” hate through AI music. To date, Australia is yet to see this sort of generative content cut through and gain traction.

And if it does, it’s not going to be considered for an ARIA award with Australia’s main music charts, announcing this week that wholly AI-generated tracks will not be eligible for the ARIA Charts. We doubt extremist propaganda creators care about winning ARIAs. Rather, the goal is to influence the people who hear it.