A popular face in the Nashville country music community admitting he would never actually live IN Nashville proper.
While Nashville has changed drastically over the years (I grew up in this town, so I’ve seen it firsthand), there are some good and some bad things that come with an expanding city. While it’s drawing in more people as the country music scene here grows, it also comes with some downfalls like heightened traffic, crime, and other issues.
The “Try That In A Small Town” singer, Jason Aldean, recently sat down with the Los Angeles Times to chat about his new album Highway Desperado (well, really only one song) and more at his steakhouse E3.
While the majority of the interview surrounded Aldean’s political viewpoints along with the controversy that surrounds his “Try That In A Small Town” track and music video, at one point, the interviewer asked Aldean why he painted a “hysterical picture of urban chaos” in his song.
Jason lives about an hour outside of Nashville (and grew up in Macon, Georgia, which is not the smallest of towns), so it painted a question as to what spurred that narrative. And he didn’t hold back:
“There’s people getting carjacked and kids getting trafficked here in Nashville. There’s s**t going on. I don’t know if when you come from a bigger city, it just becomes the new normal. I mean, I don’t live here in town. I live almost an hour outside of town.
I wouldn’t live in downtown Nashville at all.”
The interviewer from the publication asks if he made that statement due to the rise in violent crime in Nashville.
“No, no, no. But I do think in bigger cities, you have bigger problems. You’re gonna have more crime, you’re gonna have more chaos. I’m not saying it’s every major city across the country, but there are some where it gets a little wild.”
Jason and many other Nashville stars don’t live in the thick of Nashville. While most reside in towns like Franklin or Leipers Fork, sometimes even Chapel Hill, the quieter parts on the outskirts of Nashville are geared towards suburban family life.
Something that resembles the landscape that Aldean grew up in down in Georgia.
“I grew up on the outskirts… more of a farm community. Went to a little school, graduated with about 40 people in my class. Everybody knew everybody. It was a normal childhood.”
Nevertheless, Aldean echoes the sentiment that many are feeling about the chaos of living in big cities right now, and according to him, that was also, in-part, the inspiration behind his hit single “Try That In A Small Town.”
