Review Summary: Surprised this guy hasn't died of alcohol poisoning with how often he has to drown his girl's memory in a bottle.
When it comes to mainstream country music, I've found myself on both sides of the discourse; I've been an apologist (chalk it up to my having been an active fan in my youth) and I've been a cynic, a detractor. No matter how many clunkers the almost-exclusively male-centric crop of stars churns out, I'll always have a soft spot in my heart for the hit songs that ruled radio in the mid-aughts. I was 9 when I saw
Cars, which famously included Rascal Flatts' rendition of Tom Cochrane's "Life Is a Highway." Side note:
holy f*cking sh*t, that was twenty years ago. I have some retrospective reviews in the can where I'll further expound on how this was the impetus for me falling in love with not just country, but music as an art form in general, but I'll say this much for now because it's important - radio was still the central format for stars to grow their careers back in 2006, before the wild west of today's non-linear, streaming-heavy world. Listening to country stations was my pastime, and Jason Aldean, whose career was getting rolling at this time, was one of the artists I listened to the most. I still enjoy some of his hits from that early juncture, especially "Amarillo Sky." He attained A-list status in the genre during the 2010s admist the 'bro country' movement, which I join the consensus in saying is what damaged the genre's cultural prestige to the point of nearly wiping it out. It's been roughly a decade since that phase started to wind down, and the genre is
still trying to regain all of its lost ground. I think some of Aldean's stylistic choices (i.e. not just picking songs, but which flavors he likes to draw from) have played a large part in eliciting this reality, and he hasn't stopped turning in new albums, which brings us to his newly-released twelfth effort
Songs About Us.
This is his first album after briefly being at the front of the national discussion in 2023, when
Highway Desperado's lead single "Try That In A Small Town" topped the
Billboard Hot 100 and generated significant controversy for its politically charged lyrics and music video, seen explicitly as a commentary on political violence, and a contrast between rural and contemporary life. Many accused it of being cheap, ugly, tasteless and reactionary, myself included. I've undergone a bit of a spiritual and ideological evolution in these last three years, but my criticisms of that song remain - you don't get to decry your political opponents for being insular or hostile while acting yourself as a gatekeeper. Make no mistake: Aldean, even before that song was recorded, was always a poster child for a persona (not just a stylistic strain) in country music that denigrates outsiders and deifies detachment from the outside world, especially ironic given that his hometown of Macon, Georgia, with its estimated population of 150,000, is as metropolitan as they come. It's one thing to condemn political violence, but stoking the flames that create that scourge on society is another; Aldean chose the latter. His wife Brittany has also gotten down in the mud, namely with fellow country star Maren Morris, with regard to political tension. It's the exact kind of low-brow artlessness that doesn't make you any friends or score you any points, political or otherwise, with anyone. The best you can hope for once you plant your flag in this camp is to end up on the stage of the TPUSA "halftime show," lip-syncing a pre-taped performance of "Batwitdaba" (a gibberish sack of dross about cocaine btw) with Kid Rock, while supposedly promoting family values. The fish-kissing per capita in this pocket of the electorate is also dangerously high.
Aldean himself has even admitted that if he had known the history surrounding the Tennessee courthouse where he shot his video, he probably would have avoided filming there. I guess I'll grant him that much consideration? Maybe? He has at least a modicum of self-awareness. But we don't need to re-litigate his cheap political posturing any further than this, so let's talk about the music.
Songs About Us is another collection of disposable and indistinguishable radio country rock fodder. Jumble any configuration of songs from his back catalog together with any batch of songs from this album, and attempt to blindly assign them each to their correct parent album. I wouldn't hold my breath with how long that would take. It's also his most bloated offering to date, totaling twenty songs and clocking in well past the hour mark. It isn't
all bad, thankfully. "Anytime Soon" opens us up with organ arrangements, which Aldean made a point to include as an homage to country legend Ronnie Millsap. The song itself is competently performed and produced, leaning into Aldean's long-running affection for rock muscle in a familiar country template. It's
another re-tread of his most overused lyrical trope - drinking the girl's memory away. Even his solid vocals can't help to gloss over how long in the tooth this sh*t is getting.
We run into a whole slew of problems when we reach the album's lead-off single "How Far Does a Goodbye Go," which starts out mostly on track, with its marriage of a vocal turn from Aldean reminiscent of 2010's
My Kinda Party with the tepid pop influences of 2018's
Rearview Town, before spiraling into an obnoxiously loud guitar solo after the first chorus ends, that obliterates any intimacy or tenderness the song might have built up towards. Luke Bryan pops in for a cameo on the title cut "Songs About Us" and the gulf between the two men's vocal talents couldn't be more painfully obvious by now. Bryan, whose voice has timbered and strengthened with age, does a routine carry job, with Aldean's waggish brays and tired themes characteristically dragging everything down. Later on, David Lee Murphy drops by to help Aldean put a new, rock-tinged swing on his own 1995 hit "Dust on the Bottle." Murphy's original is an all-timer in the canon of country classics, and it would have been nice to see how he'd have down if he'd gone it alone, with or without the drift in composition. Aldean sings it by numbers, meaning, he doesn't butcher the song, but he fails at making it his own. Let this specific section of songs serve as a final cautionary tale; when Aldean does a duet or a cover, run for the hills. Unless it's "Don't You Wanna Stay" with Kelly Clarkson, which somehow didn't completely stink up the joint, his collaborative efforts have an uncanny knack for exposing his limited range as a vocalist.
There's one more feature to tackle, and that brings us to "Easier Gone", where Aldean is aided by his wife Brittany. Jason actually serves up the better vocal of the two. He nails his runs fairly adeptly, and while Brittany's effort is admirable, I can only describe her ability as listless, indistinct, unmemorable. Not
bad, just remarkably unremarkable. It's also quite puzzling that they chose a heartbreak anthem for a duet. Are they not happily married? I thought maybe something akin to Tim McGraw and Faith Hill's "It's Your Love" was on the menu, but I was sorely disappointed. Elsewhere, the closing cut "Lovin' Me Too Long" jumps to mind as another proverbial horse Aldean has beaten to death. He's not done "rubbing off" on his muse, as he wishes for her to love rural life (lol) as he does. It was cute when he did it on "Country Boy's World", when there was sort of a young romance type of narrative thread that made that 2010 track work. But now he and his wife are middle-aged spouses. I guess there isn't much use in dissecting a f*cking Jason Aldean album beyond a terse and summary degree, so I think I'll cut my losses and call it a day.
If you're predisposed to enjoy mainstream rock-influenced country drivel absent of cynical thought, you'll probably eat this up. And at this point, Aldean still isn't even the biggest offender among the current pool of genre heavyweights. But he is among the most boring, and if you care about this genre, and are holding onto hope that it can reclaim the cultural footprint it had, say, thirty years ago, something like this isn't doing the cause any favors.
Songs About Us doesn't have any purposefully ugly political commentary on it, but come on, how much is that really saying? This album is pretty damn
awful.
