“Try That in a Small Town”: Jason Aldean’s Banned Anthem Ignites a National Firestorm
In the dusty glare of a Tennessee courthouse shadowed by ghosts of racial terror, Jason Aldean strummed a defiant chord that shattered the airwaves, transforming a simple country tune into a lightning rod for America’s deepest divides, where patriotism clashes with protest and silence amplifies the scream.
Jason Aldean’s “Try That in a Small Town,” once a quiet ode to rural resolve, exploded into controversy after its music video was yanked from CMT amid accusations of glorifying violence at a lynching site.
Released on May 17, 2023, the track—penned by Kelley Lovelace, Neil Thrasher, Tully Kennedy, and Kurt Michael Allison—languished modestly on charts until its July 14 video drop. Filmed at the Maury County Courthouse in Columbia, Tennessee, the site of the 1946 Columbia race riot and the 1927 lynching of 18-year-old Black teenager Henry Choate, the clip intercut Aldean’s performance with footage of urban unrest: protesters clashing with police, looting, and flag-stomping mobs. Lyrics like “Cuss out a cop, spit in his face / Stomp on the flag and light it up / Yeah, ya think you’re tough” struck some as a coded call to vigilantism, while others hailed it as a stand for small-town solidarity. Four days later, CMT pulled it from rotation, citing no reason but sparking claims of censorship. Aldean, 46 and a Georgia native scarred by the 2017 Las Vegas shooting, defended it on Instagram: “I’m not going to hide the fact that there are a lot of issues going on in our country right now… This song is about us looking out for each other.”
The video’s choice of location—a courthouse steeped in racial violence—fueled accusations that the song dog-whistled to white grievance and historical trauma.
Columbia’s Maury County Courthouse, draped in an American flag for the shoot, isn’t just architecture; it’s a monument to atrocity. In 1927, a white mob dragged Choate from jail, lynching him after a false assault charge. The 1946 riot saw white mobs attack Black neighborhoods, killing at least two and wounding dozens. Critics, including Tennessee Rep. Justin Jones, branded it “a heinous song calling for racist violence,” pointing to the video’s juxtaposition of idyllic Americana—farmers helping each other, kids playing hopscotch—with clips of Black-led protests. Sheryl Crow tweeted it “promotes violence,” while Jason Isbell challenged Aldean to write his own lyrics. Aldean, denying intent, told CBS Mornings in November 2023 he’d have avoided the site if aware of its history, calling the backlash “meritless and dangerous.” The optics, however, were incendiary, amplifying fears the song romanticized gun culture and rural backlash against urban “chaos.”
CMT’s swift pull from airwaves, without explanation, ignited cries of cancel culture, propelling the song from obscurity to chart dominance.
The network’s decision, confirmed July 18, 2023, came amid mounting outrage, with no comment beyond halting rotation. Aldean’s label, BBR Music Group, blamed “third-party copyright issues” for edits, but the damage was done. YouTube views surged past 19 million, and radio play spiked as conservatives rallied. Debuting at No. 2 on the Billboard Hot 100 dated July 29, it hit No. 1 the next week—the first time the top three spots were all country acts, alongside Morgan Wallen and Luke Combs. This “Streisand effect” catapulted Aldean’s career, his first Hot 100 topper, proving backlash as booster rocket. Fans streamed it 15 million times weekly, per Luminate, while parody tracks like Adeem the Artist’s “Sundown Town” mocked its worldview. The ban didn’t silence; it sanctified, turning a mid-tier single into a cultural artifact.
The backlash divided America along partisan lines, with Republicans embracing it as free speech heroism while liberals decried it as hate speech.
GOP heavyweights piled on: Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders called it “what America is all about,” South Dakota’s Kristi Noem blasted “woke CMT,” and Rep. Lauren Boebert vowed to blast it at rallies. Trump, post his 2024 win, name-dropped it in speeches, tying it to “law and order.” On the left, NAACP chapters condemned its “lynching imagery,” and TikTok erupted with 10 million views of reaction videos overlaying lyrics on BLM footage. Columbia Mayor Chaz Molder urged future videos to “seek a more positive message.” Aldean, no stranger to fire—his wife’s 2022 transphobic post cost him PR—doubled down, performing it at CMA Fest amid boos and cheers. Polls like Pew’s 2023 survey showed 55% of rural Americans relating to its “small-town pride,” versus 70% of urbanites seeing it as divisive, exposing a nation fractured by geography and grudge.
Aldean’s defense framed the song as community anthem, not aggression, but critics saw it as veiled threat in a post-Jan. 6 era.
In his July 18 Instagram statement, Aldean clarified: “Try That in a Small Town” captures “the feeling of a community… where we take care of our neighbors, regardless of differences.” He invoked Las Vegas, where he witnessed horror, to underscore anti-violence intent, but detractors noted the gun verse—”Got a gun that my granddad gave me / They say one day they’re gonna round up”—as NRA-coded defiance. The video’s protest clips, including Ukraine footage misattributed to U.S. unrest, blurred lines further. Aldean’s history—ditching a 2017 concert after Charlottesville—added irony, but supporters saw resilience. By August 2023, it won ACM Song of the Year, a middle finger to detractors. Yet, in 2025’s hindsight, amid renewed racial reckonings, it lingers as a Rorschach test: valor or venom?
The “Try That in a Small Town” saga endures as a mirror to America’s soul, where one song’s ban birthed a movement, proving music’s power to heal or hurl stones.
From CMT’s quiet cull to Hot 100’s pinnacle, Aldean’s anthem didn’t just chart—it carved canyons in the cultural landscape. In a divided 2025, as echoes of 2020 protests fade into 2024 election scars, it reminds us: silence a song, and you amplify its soul. Whether dog-whistle or dirge for lost innocence, “Try That in a Small Town” stands as America’s fractured playlist—raw, resonant, and relentlessly replayed.
