NOTE: This article may include commentary reflecting the author’s position.
The Libs are freaking out over a country song that has offended their leftist sensibilities.
Jason Aldean’s song, “Try That In A Small Town” was originally released in May, but the video just hit the airwaves on July 14. It got some pretty heavy rotation on Country Music Television through Sunday.
Aaand that’s when the woke backlash started.
Libs are criticizing the song as … racist! (Yes, yes, a unique and completely unpredictable take, I know.)
The issue seems to be the lyrics paired with news footage of BLM and Antifa riots because holding up a mirror to their behavior is “problematic” or something.
As a result of the backlash, CMT caved to the woke mob and pulled the video from rotation.
CNN’s report is a bit confusing to someone who has just heard the song or watched the video.
Multiple outlets have reported that the music video for the single – whose politically charged lyrics have resulted in a backlash – has been pulled from CMT…
The lyrics, critics say, are evocative of vigilantism, racism and “sundown towns” that practice a form of all white segregation in which people of color and others who were considered outsiders knew they faced violence if they were not out of an area before the sun went down.
One commenter called it a “modern lynching song.”
Source: CNN
“Politically charged lyrics”?
“Modern lynching song”?
Really???
It seems to be a pretty straightforward illustration of the urban/rural divide when it comes to values and the toleration of lawlessness. It’s a condemnation of the dramatic rise in crime that is happening in so many cities in America right now while pointing out the incredulity that people in smaller communities feel when they watch the news and see what appears to be the acceptance of it as the “new normal.”
Here are the first few lines of the song:
Sucker punch somebody on a sidewalk
Carjack an old lady at a red light
Pull a gun on the owner of a liquor store
Ya think it’s cool, well, act a fool if ya like
Cuss out a cop, spit in his face
Stomp on the flag and light it up
Yeah, ya think you’re tough
Well, try that in a small town
What’s the issue there?
Those lyrics are only racist if you think that visible minorities are the only people capable of committing such acts… which would make the critics the racists. Thank you for coming to my TED Talk.
But the Left rejects that and insists that the song is racist.
For a typical (pardon my French) sh*t-Lib take, here’s the Senior Music Writer/Chief Music Critic over at Variety.
Chris Willmann presented his brainworm-infested analysis on the song on Tuesday. In it, Willmann labeled Aldean “increasingly belligerent”, described the song as “cynical” and “contemptible”, said that it stoked vigilantism, and called the songwriting — which was not by Aldean, by the way — “lunkheaded.”
Willmann is Very Upset about the song’s “implicit moral superiority of having a limited number of neighbors” instead of say, revelling in the paradoxical isolation that so often occurs with the go-go-go pace of city life, accepting that street violence from strangers as normal, and that woke D.A.s will put criminals right back n the street to reoffend if they are arrested at all.
Willmann also suggested that the location chosen for the video wasn’t selected because it provided a classic, small-town backdrop, but that the singer, the director of the music video, and probably the “lunkheaded” songwriters, are soooper-secret racists using “dog whistles” that only Libs seem to be able to hear.
Don’t worry, Willmann explains why the song and the video should be condemned in his tedious screed.
“The setting, outside the Maury County Courthouse in Columbia, Tennessee, has proven upsetting for some who know or learn the history of the building,” states Willmann in his tirade. He then goes on to “educate” you about just what the history is… a deadly racist incident from a century ago.
It’s where, in 1927, a white lynch mob dragged a young man named Henry Choate through the streets behind a car before finally hanging him from a second-story courthouse window. Let’s give Aldean and video director Shaun Silva the benefit of the doubt and assume they had not indulged in a history lesson when they decided the same frontage where a Black man was murdered in front of a crowd would be a good place to alternate projected footage of protesters being put down with a draped American flag…
…It’s easy to imagine, if you keep in mind the history of so many country artists tweeting against the Black Lives Matters protest during the pandemic, that this is what Aldean or his director have in mind when they make this the most focused part of the video…
…And the most dangerous part of the video — the part that may wipe the smirk off your face if you’re just focused on how clumsy the song is — is how it conflates the act of protesting with violent crime. Leading a march and getting in a policeman’s face is on the same level as rioting, or carjacking grandma.
Source: Variety
Ah, yes. So, “mostly peaceful protests” turning into riots at night for months on end are just fine and riots are only bad when Republicans do it in protest of what they see as a “rigged” election — the same claim that was made by Democrats after every presidential election that they have lost since 2000.
But Variety isn’t the only outlet posting some hot-take. Forbes and Newsweek both categorize the song as one “about guns.”
How disgusting is it to claim that Aldean is giving subtle nod to gun violence when he was the guy on the stage at the Route 91 Harvest Music Festival in Vegas when Stephen Paddock unleashed round after round from his hotel room window killing 58 and wounding 489 innocent people.
Oh, and the production company that made the video has noted that (a) Aldean didn’t choose the location and (b) the Maury Courthouse has been used in as a filming location a number of times without the same sort of controversy.
However, TackleBox, the company that produced the music video, told Fox News Digital that the courthouse is a “popular filming location outside of Nashville” that has been featured in a number of music videos and movies. In addition, TackleBox noted that the five-time Grammy Award nominee “did not pick the location.”
“Any alternative narrative suggesting the music video’s location decision is false,” TackleBox wrote in a statement to Fox News Digital…
…In its statement, TackleBox cited several music videos and movies that have been filmed at the courthouse, including most recently the 2022 Lifetime Original television movie “Steppin’ into the Holiday” starring Mario Lopez and Jana Kramer.
TackleBox also noted that the location was featured in a Runaway June music video for their 2019 song “We Were Rich,” the 2022 Paramount holiday film “A Nashville Country Christmas” with Tanya Tucker, and Miley Cyrus’ 2009 film “Hannah Montana: The Movie.”
Source: Fox News
So, when’s the boycott on Miley Cyrus and Mario Lopez for their apparent “dog whistle” support for racism and lynching?
The criticism of Jason Aldean should be expected. With his stance on the COVID shots and masks along with his wife’s views on the trans ideology, Aldean is not exactly a darling of the Left.
Aldean has stood firm and dismissed the claims of racism as ridiculous. He posted a statement on Twitter in response to the backlash.
In the past 24 hours I have been accused of releasing a pro-lynching song (a song that has been out since May) and was subject to the comparison that I (direct quote) was not too pleased with the nationwide BLM protests. These references are not only meritless, but dangerous.…
— Jason Aldean (@Jason_Aldean) July 18, 2023
Here it is in full:
In the past 24 hours I have been accused of releasing a pro-lynching song (a song that has been out since May) and was subject to the comparison that I (direct quote) was not too pleased with the nationwide BLM protests. These references are not only meritless, but dangerous. There is not a single lyric in the song that references race or points to it- and there isn’t a single video clip that isn’t real news footage -and while I can try and respect others to have their own interpretation of a song with music- this one goes too far.
As so many pointed out, I was present at Route 91-where so many lost their lives- and our community recently suffered another heartbreaking tragedy. NO ONE, including me, wants to continue to see senseless headlines or families ripped apart.
Try That In A Small Town, for me, refers to the feeling of a community that I had growing up, where we took care of our neighbors, regardless of differences of background or belief. Because they were our neighbors, and that was above any differences. My political views have never been something I’ve hidden from, and I know that a lot of us in this Country don’t agree on how we get back to a sense of normalcy where we go at least a day without a headline that keeps us up at night. But the desire for it to- that’s what this song is about.
Spot on, Jason. Spot on!
So, despite the CMT blackout and the backlash from the wokescolds, how’s the song doing?
Well, it would seem that the controversy has propelled the song to the Number 1 spot on iTunes.
Jason Aldean's "Try That In A Small Town" has reached #1 on US iTunes. pic.twitter.com/PXZa31xpp4
— Chart News (@chartnewspg) July 19, 2023
Jason Aldean number 1 with an anti-Antifa song
Well I never…
Congratulations @Jason_Aldean https://t.co/iVTTWYU6PP— Winston Marshall (@MrWinMarshall) July 19, 2023
Country music star Jason Aldean has had his new music video for ‘Try That In a Small Town’ pulled from Country Music Television (CMT).
The video features clips from BLM protests & antifa riots with the lyrics offering commentary on division in America.
— Oli London (@OliLondonTV) July 19, 2023
I stand with Jason Aldean pic.twitter.com/0rrNresG5G
— End Wokeness (@EndWokeness) July 19, 2023
With Disney, Bud Light, Target, all losing money, the “Sound of Freedom” movie hitting $100 Million at the box office, and now this Jason Aldean song — conservatives are really having a moment right now and it must be eating the Libs alive.
Conservatives are consistently moving markets more than any time I can remember. https://t.co/KZUf3SzWwR
— Josh Holmes (@HolmesJosh) July 19, 2023
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