At this point, pretty much everybody has chimed in on the controversy surrounding Jason Aldean‘s latest single, “Try That In A Small Town.”
Released back in May, the song calls out rioting and looting in big cities while also taking a strong stance against gun control. And the video for the song features clips of riots and looting from around the world while Aldean sings in front of the Maury County courthouse in Columbia, Tennessee.
But many online have accused the outspoken country singer of featuring racist lyrics and imagery in both the song and video, with the outcry leading CMT to pull the video from their rotation. And still others cried foul on a pro-gun anthem coming from the headliner of the Route 91 Harvest Festival, after Aldean was on stage when the massacre broke out in Las Vegas in 2017.
And it’s a conversation that has sparked reactions from…well, just about everybody.
While Sheryl Crow joined in those criticizing the song, many country stars have spoken out in support of Aldean, including Cody Johnson, Travis Tritt, and of course Brantley Gilbert. And it’s even got the attention of many politicians, with presidential hopefuls like Ron DeSantis and former President Donald Trump throwing their support behind Aldean.
And on today’s episode of The Joe Rogan Experience, Rogan gave his thoughts on the controversy surrounding the song.
While speaking with Gad Saad, an author and professor at Columbia University, Rogan expressed his confusion on the outrage:
“I’m not saying that that’s the greatest song the world’s ever known, but the level of outrage coming from people who are upset about that song is so strange when there are hundreds of rap songs out there that are infinitely worst. And also enjoyable.
No complaints at all. And we’re not even talking about old stuff. There’s new stuff too. There’s hip-hop, there’s wild rock songs, there’s a lot of wild sh*t. And to be focusing on that one?”
Rogan also expressed his confusion at the song being accused of having a racial element, when many of those who were rioting and looting during the 2020 unrest were white:
“And the racial aspect of it was crazy. Because the real Antifa problems that were happening during the BLM, I think it was a lot of white people doing that, wasn’t it?
It was a lot of lost, liberal whites who were very angry, who decided to take up this movement and smash things.
So, like, the racial aspect of it – there’s nothing racial about the lyrics.”
Of course the controversy surrounding the song really hasn’t hurt Jason or the song any.
Not only did the song shoot to the #1 spot on the iTunes all-genre chart, Aldean’s other albums saw a boost from the controversy too, at one point making up 5 of the top 10 albums on the iTunes country charts.
And now, the song itself is not only already one of the best-selling country songs of the entire year, but it’s now at #2 on the all-genre Billboard Hot 100 chart, as well as claiming the top spot on the Hot Country Songs chart.
The song made its debut on the Hot 100 chart this week, passing Morgan Wallen’s “Last Night” and Luke Combs’ cover of “Fast Car.”
And its sales have absolutely skyrocketed: After being released in May, the song had only sold 1,000 units per day the week before the controversy. But this past week, sales jumped to 228,000 units. And streams of the song have gone from 987,000 before last week to over 11.7 MILLION in the past week, a mind-boggling 999% increase.
Based on just the sales over the last week, it’s enough to make it the fourth-highest selling song of 2023.
Absolutely insane.
Music Video Quietly Edited
Meanwhile, the controversial music video for “Try That In A Small Town” appears to have had some minor changes made to it.
After racking up a whopping 19M views on YouTube, it seems as though Jason Aldean’s latest music video has been edited to take out the BLM movement footage from Aldean’s home state of Georgia.
The Washington Post reported:
“The video is now six seconds shorter than when it was uploaded to YouTube on July 14.
And it no longer contains a news clip from Fox 5 Atlanta depicting violent confrontations during Black Lives Matter demonstrations in 2020 and subsequent protests in January.”
Aldean has released a statement denying that video has anything to do with race, citing that the clips shown in the video are taken from real news footage.
And that might be the problem…
I can’t see Aldean’s team editing the music video in response to the political backlash, so was the news footage of rioting and looting in Georgia removed at the request of Fox 5 Atlanta? That could very well be the case.
According to TMZ, who provided a side by side comparison, Fox 5 has not said whether or not they requested the footage to be removed.
