One artist who definitely doesn’t understand Jason Aldean’s Try That In a Small Town video or his explanation for it is Margo Price.
And the country singer-songwriter made that clear earlier this week. In fact, she went one step further and lunged at Aldean.
“Just stopping by to say Jason Aldean is a clown,” Price wrote over a photo that appeared to show Aldean in Halloween costumes with friends. “What else can you expect from a man who wore a black face in 2015?”
Someone replied that Aldean didn’t wear a black face but instead wore camouflage on his face to match his camouflage outfit. If you look at the photo, it’s quite possible. But the man next to Aldean is not wearing camouflage and appears to have a black face.
“Lol, I know what camouflage is,” Price replied. “But there’s another guy on the left dressed like Lil Wayne, mate.”
At least things weren’t looking good for Aldean in a week that saw him accused of releasing a “pro-lynch song” and an ode to the sunset cities.
The video “Try That In A Small Town” contains several clips of clashes between protesters and police and welcomes people who “swear at a police officer”, “spit in his face” or “step on the flag and set it on fire” to “try that in a small town” and “see how far you can get on the street”.
“I have a gun my grandpa gave me,” begins the next verse.
“Here we take care of ourselves,” he sings in the chorus. “If you cross that line, it won’t be long.”
Aldean, who was present at the 2017 Route 91 music festival mass shooting in Las Vegas, was held responsible for the video’s imagery, tone and implication of gun violence, as well as racial overtones.
“In the last 24 hours I have been accused of releasing a lynching song (a song that has been out since May) and have been compared to not being too happy (direct quote) with the BLM protests nationwide,” Aldean wrote at the beginning of the lengthy post. “These tips are not only unfounded, they are also dangerous. There isn’t a single lyric in the song that refers to or hints at race – and there isn’t a single video clip that isn’t real news material – and while I can try to respect others to have their own interpretation of a song with music, this one goes too far.”
At that time, Aldean spoke about the mass shooting in Las Vegas.
“As many pointed out, I was on Route 91 – where so many lost their lives – and our community recently suffered another heartbreaking tragedy,” he wrote. “No one, myself included, wants to see pointless headlines or families torn apart any longer.”
He then tried to explain what the song meant to him.
“Try That In A Small Town” to me relates to the sense of community I had as a child where we cared about our neighbors regardless of different backgrounds or creeds,” Aldean wrote. “Because they were our neighbors and that was above all differences. I’ve never hidden my political views, and I know many of us in this county disagree on how we can return to a sense of normalcy, where we can go at least a day without a headline to keep us up at night. But the desire for it – that’s what this song is about.”
CMT pulled the song from the radio, and The Price isn’t the only big-name artist participating in the debate.
Sheryl Crow also took Aldean to task for the song and video.
“I’m from a small town,” she tweeted at Aldean. “Even people in small towns are fed up with the violence. The promotion of violence is neither small-town nor American. You should know better than anyone who survived a mass shooting. This is neither American nor small town. It’s just lame.”
Jason Isbell also followed Aldean on social media.
But there were some artists who defended Aldean.
Jake Owen fired back at Isbell for tweeting a challenge to Aldean to “write his next single himself.” That’s what we’re trying to do in my small town.”
“Jason, you’re always the first to sit behind the keyboard and spout shit like that,” Owen tweeted, ignoring that he also worked behind a keyboard. “In ‘my little town,’ you just walk up to the guy and act like a man if you want the smoke… and don’t tweet about him… tough guy.”
“For the record, I love (Jason Aldean’s) single ‘Try That In A Small Town,'” Travis Tritt wrote. “This song does not promote violence as some have claimed. It simply expresses a viewpoint shared by many Americans, against the blatant violence we have seen from so many “activist groups” around the country in recent years, and against the belief shared by millions that such behavior would not be tolerated by many people in many places in the United States. God bless America and everyone in it.”