Brad Paisley Says Russian Bots Fueled Backlash to Ukraine Song “Same Here”

Brad Paisley says his team watched the online response to his 2023 Ukraine solidarity song “Same Here” go from very positive to overwhelmingly negative — a shift he attributes to Russian bots posing as Americans.

“When it came out, the response was 98 percent positive, based on what my web guy was tracking,” Paisley said during an appearance on Rolling Stone’s Nashville Now podcast. “And then the Russian bots got ahold of it, and we watched it flip to…90 percent negative.”

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According to Paisley, both his team and people working in Ukraine were monitoring where the criticism was coming from. “They could see the origins,” he said. “It was people pretending to be Americans, or even bots pretending to be Americans, attacking in a way that seemed very believable.”

“Same Here” came out in February 2023 and was written by Paisley alongside frequent collaborator Lee Thomas Miller and Dawes’ Taylor Goldsmith in the aftermath of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Instead of writing directly about the war, the trio built the song around the similarities shared by people separated by borders, cultures, and thousands of miles.

Paisley furthered the track’s message of unity by welcoming Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky into the mix. After the two spoke over Zoom for roughly 45 minutes, a portion of their conversation was incorporated into the recording.

“We didn’t write it exactly about [the invasion], but in my mind, I remember thinking this conversation – this friend across the ocean, talking about how different are we? – would be really powerful if that conversation was captured on audio, and it was the leader of that country,” Paisley recalled.

Paisley traveled to the country in April 2023, where he met Zelensky and performed “Same Here” in Kyiv’s Saint Michael’s Square. He also became an ambassador for United24, the Ukrainian government-backed fundraising platform.

“I’ve not felt, deep in my bones, as clear a feeling of like rooting for something as I have when they got attacked,” Paisley said. “I didn’t know that would be the least bit polarizing.”

Not that the backlash changed his mind in the slightest. “You don’t do a song like that and be like, ‘But I want everyone to like it!’” he said. “No, I did that because it’s how I feel. I don’t care. You don’t have to like that.”

On Monday night, Paisley appeared at the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame ceremony to induct Taylor Swift, praising her as “somebody who has conquered the world and done it with songs.” “Same Here” co-writer Lee Thomas Miller was among this year’s inductees as well.

Watch Paisley discuss “Same Here” and more on Nashville Now below.