Jason Aldean’s Fans Follow Him Down a ‘Dirt Road’

The ubiquitous tune has already sold nearly a million downloads, and if you think you’re hearing it everywhere these days, that may be because it has also been the top-selling ringtone in all genres of music for five consecutive weeks. Since releasing his latest CD, My Kinda Party, late last year, Jason is having quite a party indeed, with the platinum-certified album recently claiming the No. 1 spot on Billboard’s Country Albums chart for the tenth time this year. With the best-selling country album of the year and a huge concert tour underway, you would think the superstar could relax and just revel in his massive success a bit.

Instead, he’s already concentrating on his next project, listening to songs and contemplating pre-production for his upcoming fifth CD. The Boot sat down with Jason to talk about his ‘Don’t You Wanna Stay’ duet partner Kelly Clarkson’s love affair with country, his feelings about critics, why he thought ‘Dirt Road’ would be a smash, and the “beach rats” he’s raising, who occasionally show up on his bus during the summer months.

‘Dirt Road Anthem’ has gotten such a huge reaction for you, especially in your live shows. Are you overwhelmed by its response?

That’s one of those songs that gets mixed reviews. People either love it or they hate it. I love it. I grew up listening to all kinds of music, everything from country to rock, pop, R&B and even rap, so for me, music is music and a great song is a great song. I would never do a song like that if I felt like we were doing it just to do it. We did that song because we felt like it was my kind of song. It was something that I would want to hear on a record. There are some people who have made negative comments about it, but we’ve had that with every single song we’ve released. So that’s nothing that I read too much into.

On that note, do you read reviews at all? Do the critics ever get to you, or do you just take it in stride?

I read them, I’ll look at them. I don’t really put a lot of stock into it. I remember when my first album came out, some critics liked it and some didn’t, and it went platinum. Next album came out, and some critics liked it, some didn’t, and it went gold. Same thing with the last two records, and they’re both platinum. To me, a critic is someone who gets paid for their opinion, and they’re entitled to that opinion but I don’t really put a lot of stock into their opinion. I’m going to cut the kind of records and the kind of songs that I like, and the kind of things that I enjoy doing. If critics dig it, that’s fine, if they don’t, that’s fine. As long as the fans dig it, that’s who I’m going after. I couldn’t care less about critics.

Read the rest of this Q&A with Jason here