Rolling Country 2023

def too many ashleys & whatnot

― werewolves of laudanum (VegemiteGrrl), Sunday, January 15, 2023 5:09 PM (four months ago)

While not exactly an Ashley, there's Ashland Craft, whose "Mimosas in the Morning" is a solid analogue to the peppier tracks on Chuck's list atop this thread.

Haven't heard the new Margo Price but I've heard it's great. Honestly, though, I still have so much trouble with all the great artists with first or last or both names that with M. Margo Price, Maren Morris, Mickey Guyton, Morgan Wade, Miranda Lambert, Kacey Musgraves, Ashley McBride, Ashley Monroe ...

― Josh in Chicago, Saturday, January 21, 2023 10:04 AM (four months ago)

"Wilder Days" by Morgan Wade (whose songs are so good, she'll make you forget about the singer with a similar name) is more Austin than Nashville, bright-but-gritty in the production, but with enough pop leanings to get radio airplay. If you remember should-have-beens the Damnations TX, you'll totally get those vibes from several songs on her Reckless LP.

Hadn't thought to connect her with Damnations TX, whose CD I still have---one of them, Amy Boone, is still with the Delines, whose latest is disappointing, but the debut, Colfaz Avenue, was still a low-rent urban countryoid vision cruise last time I checked in, and made my list for the recent female country singers poll.
Morgan's Reckless Deluxe came out in Jan. '22; here are just some of the blogged comments pulled into my 2021 blog round-up---brace yerselves, if you try reading it at all:

...Getting "Reckless" again, is one of the things she considers, wishes for sometimes, as the music moves around her---alt rock as the younger sort of potentially tops-of-the-pops country, young enough to take the 90s and early 00s over older artists' fascination with Petty and F.Mac: it's an extension and reinforcement of Wade's own electrical tuning systems, under all those tats*, flexing, always ready to go, as far as she and the guy she's talking to or around will take things--yes, and frequently it's to the limit, one more time, as stimulating prospect, because usually they have a history, and she certainly does, with and without him, alluded to with a sense of wonder, like can she beleeeve she did and was all whut---at one point recalls, maybe from the night they met, "Ah spoke mah truth, and yew got so upset"(oh the voice keeps it country alright, like the weight of personal relationship history does: one tight-jawed syllable measuring itself out at a time).

Welp--he's gotta get over it if they do try again---may be the guy she's out on an actual date with, as the music sounds atypically sedate, dinner-y, in the opening track: she's on her best behavior, sweetly murmuring, while observing, describing, thinking, "Ah wish Ah'd known you in your wilder days." Probably, undertones of voice and lyrics and accompaniment soon suggest, she'd feel like they had more in common back then---but, having heard all the songs and coming back to this one, seems like nostalgia for what might have been, the yen for a safe yet hot fantasy, which is so Morgan now, ditto the way she leans into wondering what his secret is---gotta have one; he's so Normal he must be nuts too, maybe in a program like her---maybe she'll peel back a few layers---

Soon it's "Matches and Metaphors," down the line with this guy or another, a booty call: "It's raining at my house, is it raining at yores?" But then "To hell with metaphors," she requests the comfort of his body, wonders if it will help, thinks it might, mentions a letter he wrote her, starts writing out loud her response, her script for how it might all work out for them after all---then back to the body ask, that's what it all comes back to, 'til she finally starts over, like a recording replayed, low-key intense, not gonna stop (digital not tape won't brake or break, fade in, radiate).

Of the very solid and vibrant original ten set, number 9, "Northern Air," is just okay, in this context--could be a high point elsewhere---about somebody who's stuck down here, in sordid Southern boredom, while he's up there---but the closer, "Met You"--not "Meet You," o hail naw, gotta be a history---is that comparatively rare kind of sequel that improves: it's her Godfather 2

The Jan. 2022 Reckless---Deluxe Edition does more of that, takes it all deeper and darker, on a longer, more exciting chain-chain-chain, getting wrapped around and stretched. It's not all together doomie, or not in a depresso sense---also, even visions of flight are never too florid, because she is wised up, she has been down this lane before, in her head and elsewhere. But context shades details and tone of even the mellowest, "Through Your Eyes," which is where she wishes she could see: a child,, age three, has said, "I want to be like you," which doesn't spook her a bit (as it does me, knowing her now as I kinda do), but touches her and even makes her wonder "if I should pray to you," (or is it "like you"? That would normally seem more likely, for sure, but---) as she moves from physical grace of the child to possible spiritual grace, also conflating "innocence" with "wild thoughts."

Another one has has her on the road from Tombstone, "holdin' hands with the band, six feet under," and something about "like Johnny and June": dead and loving it? Anyway rolling along, at least until "When The Dirt All Settles"---meanwhile, there's also "The Night," when she's hoping "the pills will work better this time," like the doctor says he thinks they might---I usually draw back from this kind of song, but she draws me in---eventually, there's the sole cover, providing a second of relief--something from the outside world!--but it's "We're caught in a trap/I can't walk out"---yet, as in EP's original, still kind of a sense, in the verses, of feeling around, talking lower, see it feels like this, don't it, is it possible they could, like, work it or something out after all, one more shot---all surging along towards something, of course--so Morgan.

*under all those tats: can't unsee the videos, where she looks concerned, careful, with vines snakes skank jailhouse roadmaps crawling out of the fabrics, arms sometimes seeming to pulse with power and infection. But that's her truth, and I may just have been not around young people in too long (covid alibi in a not very vaxxed red state).

Frank Kogan initially wonders if these are recovery songs—could be, but also, I reply: I haven't caught any psychobabble, or therapyspeak per se---"The Night" is disarming because she's watchful of options and the present the past the future (re title of classic girl group song) as ever, also of self, but there's no sense, for once, of her also talking to a particular guy (as I assume she otherwise does, although of course means to be overheard, though in another song it's "the woman in me" that needs "the lover in you." not "the man," so maybe not always a guy, though always is in videos I've seen; maybe she just doesn't want him to get all, "Yes! The MAN in me!"), nor is it big boo-hoo save me x confessional: the words are just finding their way out, as she's shivering, trying to get enough out that she can sleep, "without going too deep." Overall, even with some plot lines re what we gon do, the past is mainly felt through weight and implications, not coy, but left to interpretations, and relatable to anybody of any age who is feeling it times wondering about futures. Not that she isn't a disturbing presence, but relating is one part of the Morgan Experience, fer shure. (later) She's always approaching, calling, watching. Amazing how much of the same process stays musically fresh, arresting, involving. I usually think, "Should I be paid to take notes on this?" kind of songwriting, which does seem to imply search for therapy in some cases, but here, I forget to complain...

Sorry, the Delines' debut is Colfax Avenue.

Y'all heard the new Whitney Rose?

Yeah. It's good!

I already get Caitlin and Caroline Rose mixed up ... another Rose might be a problem.

Am I ready to get strung out on Whitney Rose one more time??? It's very likely to happen, "ready" or not---

Mary Gauthier's Dark Enough To See The Stars is such a story that I worry about spoilers, but here goes: each song is present tense, incl. when she's saying "Remember When" to her long-time traveling companion, the one who at the very least helped her get her shit together, maybe saved her life, which MG is inclined to believe.
So they're still going along, though "Amsterdam," for instance, then the companion pulls way out ahead, and the previously mentioned old bad-times-rolling life's "Ghosts of the Vieux Carre" suddenly seems tragically ironic--almost, but the companion is not now exactly a ghost---"The Sisters of Charity/Really did a number on me" doesn't quite match "The preacher's words hang in the air,"because those words are most of all part of the shocked clarity of the funeral or whatever--she doesn't call it "a celebration of life" either, or anything: it's just with children running around, and "all the friends I never knew you had!" and other glimpses, all wtf, wtf, wtf, so she gets back on the road, and writes more song-letters, dispatches, chapters to the now missed, not exactly missing one.

Musically, she sometimes draws on customized suggestions of graceful 70s country-folk tunes of Young and Dylan (maybe from way down in The Witmark Demos too?), with a splash of Floyd Crameresque guitar here, steel guitar there, and a bracingly Williesque interstate waltz, "Truckers and Troubadours" ("No use in keepin' score), strong enough to be a good single, gains even more from context, incl. placement in sequence of songs.
Vocal x instrumental delivery such that I notice something more with every listen, also because Imagery is fluid and precise, never too much or little. Damn, she's good.

Maybe I'll check out her book about songwriting. She's probably still involved in that long-term project of writing with war vets too (she's not the only Nashville pro doing it, but think she may have founded it, or co-founded

Luke Combs cover of Tracy Chapman “Fast Cars” is pleant enough

Pleasant

such a good song, it's hard to screw it up ... and he doesn't.

https://www.savingcountrymusic.com/the-best-country-roots-albums-of-2023-so-far/

What's on your list?

Marty Stuart album is ok. Roots country plus Byrds influences

Listening to Lainey Wilson pop country from 2022 now . Some songs I like, some too bombastic and arena for me

https://mediacdn.aent-m.com/prod-img/500/77/4210977-2977863.jpg

Little Songs is the highly anticipated new album from Canadian singer-songwriter, Colter Wall. On Little Songs, fans of Wall’s will find the same hardscrabble voice they’ve loved over the years connecting the contemporary world to the values, hardships, and celebrations of rural life. The album is produced by Wall and Patrick Lyons, and features 8 new original songs, as well as two fan-favorite covers – Hoyt Axton’s “Evangelina” and Ian Tyson’s “The Coyote & The Cowboy.”

Little Songs is an upbeat, sometimes somber glimpse into the rural work and social life of the Canadian West, and, more so than with previous albums, opens emotional turns as mature and heartening as the resonant baritone voice writing and singing them.
1. Prairie Evening/Sagebrush Waltz
2. Standing Here
3. Corralling the Blues
4. The Coyote & The Cowboy
5. Honky Tonk Nighthawk
6. For a Long While
7. Cow/Calf Blue Yodel
8. Little Songs
9. Evangelina
10. The Last Loving Words

damn---7/14/23 (& mebbe download code w vinyl?)

Wakes up and realize her name is still Sunny Michaela Freakin Sweeney, 46, double-divorcee, time to go out down the highway a little further and introduce the rules one more time, to a new recruit: "You can tie me up, but you can't tie me down." Not to say there aren't flashbacks: title track of Married Alone is a shivering, crashing, spiraling waltz, with Vince Gill co-lifting the chorus---otherwise, she has to push herself out in front of the band and any other straight-ahead detours like this,

It's just one word shouldn't be that tough
But I finally realized enough is enough
Shouldn't linger in the air or echo down the hall
As soon as I'd say it, it would be done
Then both of us could finally move on
And get out from under the weight of it all

If goodbye were as easy as hello

marital stability, though this context suggests might take an army.

Morgan Wallen’s ‘Last Night’ Tops Billboard Hot 100 for 11th Week
Plus, Luke Combs' "Fast Car" rides to No. 3, making for two simultaneous top three country hits for the first time since 2000.

Loving the new Brennen Leigh album

The Amanda Shires & Bobbie Nelson collab album is fantastic. At the risk of picking a scab, I'll say I actually like it more than the Shires solo album from last year.

I adore Brandy Clark and thought the individual songs were all very good, but the whole of her album in its entirety was just a chore to listen to. The pairing with Carlile seemed to rob her of her wittiness. The second Carlile - Tanya Tucker album, though, is one of the best of the year so far.

do y'all have any label Bandcamps you keep an eye on for country releases? i know New West and Rounder are on there ... not sure about other stuff, either "bigger" than those or small labels that focus on country music.

I adore Brandy Clark and thought the individual songs were all very good, but the whole of her album in its entirety was just a chore to listen to.

Even the songs are a chore to listen to.

Haven't listened yet---I thought some of her earl tracks were overworkshopped, self-conscious, but really enjoyed Your Life Is A Record.

And the reason I haven't listened yet is that I'm still, believe it or not, doing a round-up of re-re-etc.-listening objects for a blogpost about the music of 2022. There are just a few sticking points left, with Lainey Wilson's Bell Bottom Country somewhut unexpectedly among same. It had taken several listens to reach a peak of enthusiasm---seemed too contrived, and also I belatedly discovered that increased volume revealed more conviction in tone and details---but I assumed that I had gotten it, and could come back to said peak several months later: no. Same process, same learning curve, all over again, even though it seemed reasonably loud at first---it's not all about the volume, this elusively problematic aspect, but for sure, if you want your sensitive arena rock country, you gotta be ready with the volume (to ride it back a little for the double-tracked armor or scar tissue, a signifying part of the looking back in candor in the finely written "Watermelon Moonshine,"but still a little too loud), ready, often enough, to throw your headphones into the maelstrom ov fun like she does her head on "This One's Gonna Cost Me," title and chorus of which become this album's thee most explicit expression of her exciting dynamic: persistent self-image of a good girl, raised right, looking for love and self-empowerment, who rat now wants to have a good good good time.
Here we have a recurring sort of Zep-hop beat at its heartiest, swaying that big horned head one more time, but now it also occurs to me that producer Jay Joyce also appreciates Led Z.'s mix of the heavy and brash with the fingerpicking side of life, and Wilson responds, going barefoot down a b-melody line to the ripples of Molly Tuttle's banjo, or for that matter under an intro of what sounds like some kind of mellotron-banjo.

(Joyce's only misfire: "Wildflowers and Wild Horses" starts with a mysterioso Lee Hazlewoodesque instrumental scrim, but then turns Lainey loose to gallop through big loud bravura rhetoric, losing Lee's control and tension.)
Beats vary, but clock gentle intensity in ballads, like when she credibly salutes "Daddy's Boots," with a bit of atypical toe-tapping added, then strips away the usual roots-view to "Momma's crazy and Daddy's mean," when it's down to "Me, You and Jesus" getting through: "Me" first, part of the candor again, "Jesus" the only mention, that's how young and desperate she is in this flashback, "You" can be anybody she trusts, trying to hold on to this isolated, shared undercurrent of faith and hope and getting by is the point, and not so loudly that Momma and Daddy will hear.
Followed immediately by "Hold My Halo," cause cuz she's paid her Dew Drop Inn dues, gonna ride that electric bull one more time tonight. See there always has to be a justification, which could get annoying in the uniquely narrowcast "Weak-End" (yes we know you're lookin' for love, but that's not all, not in them places), if not for distraction of the gently antsy beat), with need for alibi and recreational therapy at its funniest and near-rowdiest in "Smell Like Smoke" ("It's cause Ah been, through, Hellll.")
Wiki sez that one was "tacked on" to streams and downloads: too bad for CD and LP buyers, because it and the other tackee, "New Friends," are antipodal highlights. After the 4-Non-Blondes cover--where she conscientiously delivers teeming verbosity rushing to the accidental but still stupid comedy of anticlimatic "Whut's going on?"---Wilson returns to the vibrant twilight of "You, Me and Jesus," now resolving to find new friends, rather than just moping over that guy---atta girl, as she says in song of that title, also a gentle one, though given the louder ones, one might wonder just what kind of friends. TBA.

A retraction, and apology for my disgraceland display of effusion for xpost American Heartbreak: I now find myself unable to continue past track 10 or so, what with Zach B's abject drops of remorse and desire and insight and obsession with self and other continuously and monotonously sliding off the Mellenplate---the Mellentemplate leaned on by so many raspy bluejean-jacketed young and not so young men of country for the past 20 years, at least. Not that the Coug himself wouldn't do his damndest to build a listenable record around such inclinations. I mean, good luck with patching yourself back together, ZB, but if you want musicmaking as therapy, maybe get with Mary Gauthier, who has all that experience writing with war vets.

I mean that seriously, but there should be a good producer who can stand to this sort of thing some of the time.

Willie's First Fourth of July Picnic was 50 years ago today
Michael Corcoran

Just as magic mushrooms grow out of cow manure, the musical event that put Austin on the map on July 4, 1973 sprouted from a financial shitshow on the same Hurlbut Ranch. The three-day Dripping Springs Reunion in March 1972, dubbed “the Country Woodstock” by promoters, anticipated crowds of 60,000 a day for a mix of country legends- Buck Owens, Loretta Lynn, Merle Haggard, Roy Acuff, etc.- with hip, offbeat favorites Willie Nelson, Waylon Jennings, Kris Kristofferson, Roger Miller, and Tom T. Hall. Projections were 160,000 short, as a total of only 20,000 came through the gates. The crowd for Friday’s bluegrass lineup, including Bill Monroe and Earl Scruggs was a paltry 2,000. Biggest day was Sunday, with Willie, Kris, Rita Coolidge and Waylon playing to 12,000. It was “a successful failure,” according to Mike McFarland, one of the four promoters from Dallas who lost their asses.

No apologies necessary. An album as long as Bryan's will have more than enough okay things. Nevertheless, I like the album. You hear Mellencamp in your average country guy? Really? I wish! Those tropes can get them through a lot of bilge.

Have you read this: https://www.stereogum.com/2223439/zach-bryan-came-out-of-nowhere/reviews/concert-review/

https://daily.bandcamp.com/best-country/bandcamp-best-country-june-2023

Ben Salmon for Bandcamp likes Brennan Leigh, Fust, Tanya Tucker, the Kody Norris Show, Jenny Don’t & the Spurs, and Jason Isbell, Caitlyn Canty and a few more

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2023/07/24/country-musics-culture-wars-and-the-remaking-of-nashville?mbid=social_twitter&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter&utm_brand=tny&utm_social-type=owned

Morris had recently had a few skirmishes online with right-wing influencers—notably, Brittany Aldean, the maga wife of the singer Jason Aldean. Morris had called her “Insurrection Barbie”; in response, Jason Aldean had encouraged a concert audience to boo Morris’s name. Both sides had sold merch off the clash. The Aldeans hawked Barbie shirts reading “don’t tread on our kids.” Morris fans could buy a shirt that read “lunatic country music person”—Tucker Carlson’s nickname for her—and another bearing the slogan “you have a seat at this table.” (She donated the proceeds to L.G.B.T.Q. charities.)

In country music, the city v rural= corrupt v moral binary has existed for a long, long time.

Let’s think about how Aldean’s latest anti-city song is part of a longer tradition in country music, rather than an outlier. pic.twitter.com/rWQP4bmJMd

— Amanda Marie Martinez (@Amammartinez) July 17, 2023

Good point

Jason Aldean shot this at the site where a white lynch mob strung Henry Choate up at the Maury County Courthouse in Columbia, Tenn., after dragging his body through the streets with a car in 1927.

That's where Aldean chose to sing about murdering people who don't respect police. https://t.co/gBL7FlaBS2 pic.twitter.com/eGfmMc8HAI

— Ashton Pittman (@ashtonpittman) July 17, 2023

I prefer Miranda Lambert, Kacey Musgraves, et al's takes on small town life as ceaselessly nosy, gossipy, and conniving.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jRdkrDk0BQ0

truer lols were never loled

xxpost Well duh, Aldean's song is so far beyondo Buck's---which is the xpost fussy small towner gone to Beeg Sheety, the funnier for seeming sincere enough, as Buck perhaps remembers his own first impressions----butt young Jason started out closer to Buck's and Miramda etc.'s view---as I mentioned in an early 00s discussion of rednecks vs. hillbillies (in songs and videos)"

Of course, irony brings a nice tang to the New Earthiness of recent country, which is a healthy countertrend to the anxieties of life during wartime. (And now floodtime, and so on.) So, with CMT cornpone-playa Jason Aldean bringing the sight of "the neighbor's butt crack, as he's nailin' up the shin-gles" to the New Earthy party on his hit video "Hicktown," sure, I'll salute it. But Aldean's music reminds me of driving a pickup truck over railroad ties and bad roads, just for the heck and the habit of it. Which can be fun, like the song. Yet even before the price of gas went up so much, it was kinda dumb to drive around like that just for the heck of it -- and obstinately so.
And that -- whether it's self-mocking or self-righteous or surrogate-seeking or mostly commercial -- is what representations of "redneckism" come down to, most of the time: that 'necks are dumb and obstinate.
Hillbillies, on the other hand, are more likely to be crazy and sexy. You might look perfectly normal, but if you have a recessive 'billy gene in there somewhere, one of these days you're just gonna jump out the window and go whoopin' 'round the mountain with Bugs Bunny and Dolly Parton.

aldean's song, incidentally, was struggling to rise much further than its debut position on the country airplay charts, and is now seeing a major sales/streaming boost as a result of this

the ppl from the morgan wallen thread who argued that his popularity was ascendant anyway and that his post-controversy gains had little to do w/ vindictiveness felt by fans (and non-fans engaged in the culture wars) should take note

i hate to be cynical, but both the lyrical content and video seem to be constructed to dogwhistle as loudly as possible while also also carefully making sure to remain (barely) within bounds of plausible deniability ('all the protesters in the video are white!' 'the lyrics don't even refer to race!' etc.) and i do not doubt that aldean & co. basically expected and aimed for this controversy to occur. this is the sweet spot that some among the meticulous pro songwriters and imagemakers of nashville aspire to hit nowadays. absolutely repugnant

it's been some years now since maga-wave right-wing grievance songs would semi-routinely sell rly well on itunes for a few days, maybe even scrape one week's billboard charts, then fall away. now here we are with a major country star trying to tap into that with his mainstream radio-promoted single. i doubt this will be the end of it. last year country radio had a hit with a lyric trying to sweetly normalize the popular framing for anti-abortion legislation (heartbeats/8 weeks/whatever). (or was it 2 years ago? i can't stomach actually listening to country radio anymore.) now here were are this year. what next?

i really really disliked that new yorker article about nashville. the writer admits in the piece to conceiving of it as a strawman battle between sexist racist nashville and the queer POC underground upstarts and frankly it never recovers from there. in particular i find it insane that someone could write that many words about contemporary challengers to mainstream country & not write a single word about zach bryan, who is easily the biggest threat to conventional nashville in decades & has spoken out to support trans people to boot. if you go see a show of his he is attracting the bro-est of the bros, while also being a bro himself, but bcuz of that his voice has the opportunity to matter more than anyone else in that piece, from marren morris & jason isbell on down. which isn't to say it should be a zach bryan article but to not even mention him once immediately called into question whether the writer really understands the subject she's writing about. and relatedly to that there is no actual writing about music in that piece, and how that is functioning w/in the changing landscape of nashville -- when you're writing about music culture, the music itself is pretty important. very little to no mentions of streaming and how that is changing things etc -- we get the tired example of morgan wallen vs the dixie chicks w/ no context about how the music industry has changed dramatically in the last 20 years. just really poor stuff & the new yorker's recent music issue was great so it was disappointing to see

the ppl from the morgan wallen thread who argued that his popularity was ascendant anyway and that his post-controversy gains had little to do w/ vindictiveness felt by fans (and non-fans engaged in the culture wars) should take note

i don't think we need to have this convo again but it was shown definitively in that thread that the "post-controversy gains" were confined to the first week, to the tune of +8 million streams, and after that he bled tens of millions of streams for months on end. which isn't to say that there aren't country music fans who are inspired by reactionary politics, bcuz of course that's true and there's examples of it all over the place transcendent of just country music, but on a factual level i would adjust this statement moving forward bcuz it sounds surface level true but if you have access to the data it just... isn't. in reality the data shows the opposite of what is claimed -- there was a small reactionary bump in the first week but a vast more number of people fled for the hills. in reality, it wasn't until "last night" (two full years) that his streaming numbers returned to what they were in the week before the video leaked.

which is all to say that i guess we'll see where this aldean thing goes. any artist in any genre who generates any sorta mainstream headline type controversy sees a minor increase in streams in the immediate week following (link), but i'm not sure that tells us anything about the world that we don't already know. it seems like there is institutional pushback against this but how much does that matter? i'm honestly not sure. it mattered more than people realize in the case of morgan wallen, but only for so long. the push-pull between institutional power and democratic power is one that defines american culture in general right now, and even w/in music, is quite similar to stuff that happens in rap, pop, etc. aldean has his supporters, but even w/in nashville he is a figure of division, not unification, and leaning into his own marginalization may mobilize his fanbase to buy/stream his music, but it will also isolate them. and that's pretty much the best that can be done in an economy where consumers can bypass institutional barriers and provide direct support via purchases or plays.

I've been enjoying Isbell trolling him, that's for sure.

Adeem with a response.

Alright I caved to my record label and did a cover of the new @jason_aldean song. Please share it around & enjoy! I love COUNTRY MUSIC! & how inclusive it is!! pic.twitter.com/RPCUyy1FiS

— Adeem the Opryist (@AdeemTheArtist) July 20, 2023

the Nate Silver of country racism

remember when tim mcgraw released "sundown heaven town"

Adeem The Artist was really good when I saw them play a month or so ago.

their album is excellent ... released at a terrible time (early December of last year) in terms of getting the attention it deserved.

Adeem is awesome, it's been great to watch them catch fire a bit this year.

I've been enjoying Isbell trolling him, that's for sure.

Some of his tweets have been good, and while it was interesting to learn that Aldean didn't write the song himself-- Kurt Allison, Tully Kennedy, Kelley Lovelace and Neil Thrasher wrote "Try That in a Small Town," bashing Aldean for not writing the song himself seems kinda less effective as a troll dis as lots of singers use songwriters.

FWIW, I don't think Aldean has had a single writing credit since something like 2009, which is impressive. Even Morgan Wallen (who Isbell has also trolled for his team of writers) has several on his latest record.

I think one of Isbell's lines of attack was essentially that with no skin in the writing game, Aldean was in no position to defend the song.

Seriously how do you defend the content of a song you weren’t even in the room for? You just got it from your producer. If you’d been there when it was written, you’d be listed as a writer. We all know how this works. https://t.co/4trCw0S98k

— Jason Isbell (@JasonIsbell) July 20, 2023