INDIANAPOLIS (WISH) — Jason Aldean’s new song “Try That In A Small Town” has been criticized for racist song lyrics, the use of a 2020 protest video, and the location of the music video.
Country Music Television pulled the music video after it received criticism.
The song’s video was filmed in front of the Maury County Courthouse in Columbia, Tennessee. This spot has historical significance as the site of a race riot in 1946, and the lynching of an 18-year-old Black teen named Henry Choate in 1927.
Aldean himself has defended the song in a tweet saying it “refers to the feeling of a community that he had growing up.”
Doneisha Posey, the vice president and general counsel of Black Onyx Management consultancy on the north side of Indianapolis, disagrees.
“This painful legacy of such events resonates differently with various communities today, particularly the Black community. If we’re not considering the perspectives of individuals that may feel threatened, marginalized or misrepresented by the content of the song and its visuals we are not living up to the ideals of what the United States of America could and should be.”
Posey said the song lyrics and imagery could create danger for marginalized communities. “It’s dangerous and disturbing and the hints at violence and the historic nods are clearly dog whistles of racism that we can not ignore.”
TyJuan Garrett, a vice president of the Greater Indianapolis Branch of the NAACP, said the song attempts to create division. “At the end of the day, it seems like you’re trying to drive a wedge, like the urban wedge, when in all actuality there is no urban community or rural community. There is community.”
Jason Hammer from the “Hammer and Nigel Show” on Indianapolis radio station WIBC said the Tennessee courthouse has previously been used in other pieces of music and art. “This courthouse is used in a lot of movies, a lot of TV shows, probably best-known as having a big role in the Hannah Montana movie. So, it’s not like this was chosen specifically. It was probably something set up.”
Hammer said the video and song are protest art, and free speech must be respected. “If you’re an absolute free speech person, which I am, you have to respect it and it kind of feels like this needs to go both ways.”
Hammer said he does not believe this will affect Aldean’s career negatively while Posey said she is unsure what will come of it.
Aldean will perform at Ruoff Music Center in Noblesville on Sept. 16.
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