A country music artist, Jason Aldean, and his music video featuring the song, “Try That in a Small Town” was pulled from the play list of Country Music Television due to its controversial lyrics and background images. Frankly, I was shocked. Who the hell watches music videos. Didn’t that thing die in the 90’s? Does MTV still exist? And what prey tell is Country Music Television. Is there really a whole TV network devoted to people wearing cowboy hats who sing love songs to their pickup trucks while sounding like they have a terminal nasal infection. OK, I am not a fan of country music, with the exceptions of Rodney Carrington’s “Show Them to Me” and Tim Wilson’s “First Baptist’s Bar and Grill”. And who can forget the poetry inherit in the following:
“Drop kick me Jesus, through the goal posts of life.
End over end, neither left, nor the right.
Straight through the heart of them righteous uprights.
Drop kick me Jesus, through the goal posts of life.”
Could Shakespeare have been more eloquent? I don’t think so! But as a whole country music sucks and even their super stars know it. Look at Garth Brooks trying to rebrand himself as Chris Gains so he could take the clothes pin off his nose and sing some real songs. He was so desperate to escape country music, he even pretended to be an Australian. But I digress. Let’s go back to Jason Aldean.
For those of you who have been asleep or trapped in a collapsed mine shaft for the past week, I will bring you up do date. Back in May the song was released with the video coming out in July. The lyrics talk about small town virtues like protecting your neighbor’s mom from car jackers, lifting your local cop’s spirit after being spit on by a flag burning hippy, and then following that hairy fucker out of town and shooting him with the gun your daddy gave you. OK! OK! I am paraphrasing a bit here. But the background film clips show black live matter protesters breaking stuff and police charging possible peaceful protesters. This video was intentionally provocative. My guess is that the song was not making enough money. It is country music, and most people don’t give a shit. So, Mr. Aldean made a video that had racist dog whistles. Apparently black people are scary to small town folks and if that helps Mr. Aldean career so be it.
Then there is the matter of the videos back drop. The Maury County Courthouse was the scene of a horrendous lynching in 1927. An 18-year-old black man was wrongly accused of raping a 16-year-old white girl. Even though the black teenager was taken to jail, a mob of 250 men surrounded the jail and started to break in. To prevent damage to the building, the door was unlocked allowing the mob access to the prisoner. He then was beaten with sledgehammers, dragged outside, tied to the bumper of a car and dragged to the courthouse. Then he as lynched. I am pretty sure he was dead before they strung him up. So, was it really a lynching or the lessor offense of abuse of a corpse? I had to look up the definition of lynching which is to “kill, especially by hanging, for an alleged offense with or without a legal trial.” This means that the hanging part of a lynching can be done after the fact, as a result there are no flaws in the semantics. Regardless of the definition and the disgusting nature of the event, I was absolutely positive that no one could ever use this as an example of acceptable small-town values. Or so I thought.
After CMT pulled the video, Facebook exploded with thousands of pro Jason comments. If you know me or have read any of my past blogs, you will realize that I can’t keep my mouth shut. I need to respond when I see errors in logic among my fellow humans. Can’t help myself and big pharma has not, as of this writing, come up with a drug to help me quell this impulse. Duck tape? But then I digress again. Is there a drug for that?
I read on Facebook this defense of the Jason song by a probably very nice lady:
“But rappers can sing about the hood life of drugs, guns and killing!! This is so messed up!! I support Jason Aldean 109%”.
I tend to agree with that assessment. Song lyrics often contain language and ideas that are indicative of being really fucked up. And these are not just coming out of the mouths of some black rapper who is encrusted with 20 pounds of gold chains and wearing a hat on sideways. For example, Janis Joplin’s great hit, “Bobby MaGee” contains this passage:
“I pulled my harpoon out of my dirty red bandana and was blowing sad while Bobby sang the blues.”
This is about shooting up heroin under unsanitary conditions. OK, it was Janis Joplin. She did not live a role model evoking life. That is something that would never be sung about if you were a good ol country boy. Didn’t Willie Nelson, the country icon, cover that song as well? He had such an honest voice. But I digress again. Back to my response to the Facebook lady. I wrote:
“Your right. But you should also recognize the lyrics, video, and the location is a place that is noted for lynching. This is problematic. This was intentional. Jason was making a statement and appealing to an audience. You need to be sure that these are your values. Maybe I am woke, but it’s better than being asleep.”
My comment was replied to by a man who among other things said:
“….lynching could be justified or just plain shooting the people that were burning, looting hurting people for no reason….it would have stopped Seattle and Portland riots, society cannot accept lawlessness like BLM again. It opens the door to other problems that larger cities are having. His song is spot on. He is showing his values, that prove that small towns usually treat, care, and help people more than larger cities”.
If these are small town values I want no part of them, even though I live in one. Ironically, the man who posted that comment was named Christian. So sad.