Grian Chatten says nobody told Fontaines D.C. about AI in the 'Marianne' video, and the band will ban it by contract

Grian Chatten found out about the AI in Fontaines D.C.’s “Marianne” video from an article, at 5:30 in the morning, after fans had already spotted it.

He told the Los Angeles Times on October 21, 2026 that someone on the video’s VFX team used “some kind of AI in the workflow,” and nobody told the band. “Apparently, not even our label or our management were told about it and it was a real shock,” Chatten said.

Over 110 people worked on the video, which went up on August 18 with 3 people credited as “AI artists.” The band’s answer is a contract clause: no AI in their music videos from now on.

How did AI end up in Fontaines D.C.’s ‘Marianne’ video?

“Marianne” is the lead single from “Dopamine Chamber”, the band’s fifth album, which XL Recordings released on October 16. Dave Meyers and Cam Erickson directed the video, according to the credits on the official YouTube upload, which passed 2 million views by October 22.

Fans in the Fontaines D.C. subreddit spotted the “AI artists” credit on release day, Paste reported. By the time Paste published on August 18, the same 3 names were listed as “VFX artists”, and that’s how the credits read today.

Chatten called the video “a real huge human effort”: “So all those main scenes and main effects and stuff were VFX and prosthetics, like the cheeks and everything.” The AI came in somewhere in “the workflow or the postproduction.”

The credits name 3 VFX studios: Foreign Xchange, Pineapple VFX and Deep VFX. Paste noted that Pineapple VFX and Deep VFX both say on their websites that they use generative AI, and Pineapple’s AI page reads: “AI is a tool in the workflow. Thinking and taste stay human.”

Chatten didn’t say which studio or which shots were involved.

What did Grian Chatten say about AI and ‘Dopamine Chamber’?

The timing hurt because of what the record is about. NME describes “Dopamine Chamber” as an album about isolation, social collapse and a growing dependence on technology.

Chatten called the situation “very contradictory” and pointed straight at the album’s themes. He said he’d planned to talk about AI in interviews anyway, “and then this kind of pulled the rug from under that conversation a little bit.”

When the LA Times asked how he feels about AI, he didn’t hedge.

“

AI is literally rendering our souls obsolete and I think that is true death.

The interviewer put the “it’s here, we have to deal with it” argument to him. Chatten’s reply: “We should just shut it off.”

How will Fontaines D.C. keep AI out of their next music videos?

With the contract. “We’re gonna have it written into our contracts going forward that like it can’t be in our music videos,” Chatten said. “I don’t condone it.”

He didn’t share the wording, and no clause text has been published. The “Marianne” credits show why a band might want one: the video went through 2 directors, an edit house, 3 VFX studios and a post-production studio, and nobody told the band, XL or management that AI was part of the process.

Consent is also what the musicians’ union AFM asked the major labels for when it launched Human Made, Human Paid on October 20, for any use of musicians’ work to train AI or generate music. And Fontaines D.C. aren’t the only act fielding AI questions about a video this month:

• Grimes’ team confirmed the “Accelerando” video used AI as a supplementary VFX tool next to a crew of more than 70 people.
• Olivia Rodrigo’s team answered AI claims about the “expectations” video with hand-drawn behind-the-scenes footage.
• Northface God deleted his “Faker” video after it used an AI likeness of T1’s Faker without consent.

Chatten didn’t say when the next Fontaines D.C. video is due, but the no-AI rule will be in that contract.