Comments on: Nothing Much Goin’ on Around Here: Jason Aldean Makes Nowhere Big Business

By: Jon

Jon — Thu, 01 Nov 2012 15:44:29 +0000

“Jon -I meant that I could not see Aldean…blah blah blah.”

Same thing. Since millions of other people obviously see him doing something you don’t, these clearly aren’t statements about him and his performance, they’re statements about you and your perception.

By: luckyoldsun

luckyoldsun — Thu, 01 Nov 2012 03:36:45 +0000

“…Any woman beside his wife.”

MH–
Yes, I’m aware that Jason Aldean has reportedly been involved in a situation with a woman other than his wife, though I haven’t followed it.

Hey, that puts Aldean in one respect in the same as Hank Williams, Lefty Frizzell, Johnny Cash, George Jones, Willie Nelson, Merle Haggard, Buck Owens, Glenn Campbell, Kenny Rogers, Vince Gill, and Garth Brooks. I don’t get the feeling that that’s going to be the impediment to Aldean’s joining them in the Hall of Fame.

By: CraigR.

CraigR. — Thu, 01 Nov 2012 01:42:43 +0000

Jon -I meant that I could not see Aldean coming out of his performance mode, which I believe conveys a state of boredom, to really connect with any real emotion or story.

Leeann you are correct about John Rich. He did write some Aldean’s first hits. Aldean use write songs too. I wonder why he never put one out as a single- now that he has an audience.

By: Leeann Ward

Leeann Ward — Thu, 01 Nov 2012 01:25:06 +0000

I always thought that Aldean ripped his rock sound from Big and Rich. Wasn’t John Rich involved in Aldean’s early mainstream career? “Hicktown” definitely sounds like something that you’d hear Big and Rich record…not to mention that John Rich was a writer on early Aldean songs.

By: Holly Gleason

Holly Gleason — Wed, 31 Oct 2012 22:48:03 +0000

To DKW…
I love your passion and respect your opinion,
but like so many people who find today’s Nashville egregious at best and criminal at worst,
I have to take exception.
You don’t have to like Aldean’s jugheaded take on life, or think that the audience’s frustration manifestation in his 2-dimensionality is crap,
but you miss the point.
As a non-involved mainstreamer, it’s easy to make these guys puppets. Aldean has always been outlier… his first single was called “Hicktown” on a crappy little label most people in Nashville thought was a joke…
Michael Knox, the architect of the sound, has been with him since before there was the crummy indie record deal… and he’s always had this take on Aldean’s kinda country.
These are NOT members of the Music Row Club. Indeed, the Row is trying to figure out how to xerox this was anemic results — and it’s only nominally successful, because it’s not a posture, it’s a reality in a whole lot of America.
This is NOT deep stuff… It is as Mr. Morton acknowledged, their version of Night Ranger… But it’s connecting. And that says A LOT about the people buying it: people who will probably vote Romney against their own best financial interests and welfare.
So, yeah… he ain’t no chimp, ain’t no puppet.
I know: I’ve been covering mainsteam country since I was a sophomore in college for THE MIAMI HERALD, and have watched the tides rise and fall, the Credibility Scare of the late 80s, the neotrads of the early 90s, the Garth Boom, the Shania pop and yes, the Kenny Chesney beachparty on steroids.
Recognize what’s there, then figure out how to build a better music trap I say; but you only create change when you’re real about where we’re starting!

By: Ken Morton, Jr.

Ken Morton, Jr. — Wed, 31 Oct 2012 22:16:39 +0000

You know, “we’ve got this dated rock sound as a signifier of the emotion we want to project, so we don’t have to bother finding our own expressive forms.” I think that's the crux of Holly's point. They are finding their own expressive sound and niche within country music. What they are doing has never been done within the genre they're playing. Are they stretching those boundaries? Yes. They are using their own personal music influences/history to recreate a sound that's (controversially) turned country up on its ear. They're using that 80's and early 90's rock influence on their version of country music to help separate themselves from what came before them.

By: DKW

DKW — Wed, 31 Oct 2012 22:13:01 +0000

You’re giving Aldean waayyyy too much credit. To think he does anything other than sing exactly what Music Row tells him is just not paying attention. But to think that he consciously sings songs of “dissonance” that reflect the emotions of a certain generation and come from personal experience is just plain ignorant. He is a simple creation of Music Row, designed to sell records to bored suburbanites and self-proclaimed “rednecks” who love to tell everyone just how redneck they are.

Perhaps the problem with this country’s direction lies in the apathetic-yet-somehow-still-angry crowd to which Aldean sings and purports to be a part of. As an authentic country singer, Sturgill Simpson, writes: “the most outlaw thing that a man today can do is give a woman a ring.” Aldean is a farce, and not even an entertaining one.

By: Rick

Rick — Wed, 31 Oct 2012 22:01:35 +0000

I’m always impressed by writers who are gifted enough to make me interested in something that I truly don’t give a rip about! (lol) If all these people find comfort and empowerment in identifying with honest and truthful mediocrity, well good for them. I would love to tie this concept into Obama somehow, but know this post would get deleted if I did. Holly has proven once again that thoughtful and insightful analysis of even the most mundane things can elevate them far above their raising…

By: Jon

Jon — Wed, 31 Oct 2012 21:59:28 +0000

It still surprises me that there are people who think a sentence that begins with “I can’t imagine that…” is somehow going to be taken as revealing more about whom it’s written about than about whom it’s written by.

By: MH

MH — Wed, 31 Oct 2012 19:31:01 +0000

“I can’t imagine Aldean getting excited over anything.”

I can, Craigr. Any woman besides his wife.