Cody Johnson Offers Support to Jason Aldean Amid ‘Try That in a Small Town’ Controversy
During his concert on Friday night (July 21) in St. Louis, Cody Johnson let his thoughts be known about the controversy surrounding Jason Aldean‘s latest song and video, “Try That in a Small Town,” which was removed from rotation by CMT earlier in the week.
Graham Allen, host of the Dear America podcast, posted a video of “Til ‘You Can’t” hitmaker Johnson coming to Aldean’s defense during the show at St. Louis’ Chaifetz Arena.
“We live in a time where everyone gets p—-ed off at Jason Aldean for putting out a song,” Johnson said, adding, “If you’re videoing this, and Jason Aldean if you’re seeing this video, you keep it up, brother. You do you, boo boo.”
Johnson went on to note his interpretation of the song as a patriotic one, saying, “If being patriotic makes you an outlaw, then by God, I’ll be an outlaw.”
Artists including Travis Tritt, John Rich and Lee Greenwood have spoken out in defense of Aldean, while Aldean’s labelmate Blanco Brown defended Aldean, but emphasized that he strongly disagreed with the song itself. Artists such as Jason Isbell, Adeem the Artist, Margo Price and Sheryl Crow have slammed both the song and Aldean.
Aldean released “Try That in a Small Town” in May, and performed it during his Nissan Stadium set at CMA Fest in June. However, the video for the song was released last week; the clip and the song quickly began to draw criticism on social media from commenters who called the song racist and pro-gun. Commenters also noted the location of the video, which was filmed at the Maury County courthouse in Columbia, Tenn. — the same location where an 18-year-old Black man, Henry Choate, was lynched in 1927. CMT pulled the video from its rotation on Tuesday (July 18), a move that sparked both praise and backlash on social media.
In addition to releasing a statement about the controversy earlier in the week, Aldean also spoke out in a lengthy speech during his own concert on Friday night in Cincinnati, Ohio.
“It’s been a long week and I’ve seen a lot of stuff suggesting I’m this, suggesting I’m that,” Aldean told the crowd in a fan-captured video. “I feel like everybody’s entitled to their opinion. You can think something all you want to, it doesn’t mean it’s true. What I am is a proud American. I’m proud to be from here. I love our country. I want to see it restored to what it once was before all this bulls— started happening to us. I love my country, I love my family, and I will do anything to protect that, I can tell you that right now, he said, as the crowd began to chant “USA! USA!”
He also added, “You guys know how it is this day and age, cancel culture… This day and age, if people don’t like what you say, they try to make sure they can cancel you, which means try to ruin your life. Ruin everything. One thing I saw this week was a bunch of country music fans that can see through a lot of the bullshit. I saw country music fans rally like I’ve never seen before and it was pretty badass, I gotta say. Thank you guys so much. I know a lot of you guys grew up like I did. You kind of have the same values, the same principles that I have, which is we want to take our kids to a movie and not worry about some asshole coming in there shooting up the theater.”
Before launching into “Try That in a Small Town,” Aldean told the crowd, “So somebody asked me, ‘Hey man, you think you’re going to play this song tonight?’ The answer was simple. The people have spoken and you guys spoke very, very loudly this week.”
After the controversy erupted, Aldean’s sales and streams have surged, according to preliminary reports from Luminate, and the video has now earned 14 million views on YouTube.
Jessica Nicholson
Billboard
