Bobby Bones clarified his comments regarding Morgan Wallen & the CMAs on Friday (July 16).
On Wednesday (July 14), Bones shared his opinion on the Wallen CMA controversy, which prompted reactions from fans and artists on social media and that Bones said was misconstrued, so now he is clarifying what he meant by his remarks.
“Dang. Hate that this was misinterpreted by some. My goal is to be overly inclusive in country music. So def didn’t feel good to hear otherwise,” Bones tweeted alongside a video clarifying his comments on Morgan Wallen and the CMA Awards controversy.
In a just over 6-minute clip shared by The Bobby Bones Show, the iHeartRadio on-air personality explained his comments on Wallen and the CMAs to further clarify his remarks, while also admitting that it’s an uncomfortable situation to discuss but he also said he feels as though it’s his “job to talk about certain things that are uncomfortable.”
“I’m talking about the Morgan Wallen situation which is very difficult for anyone to talk about but I feel like I should talk about it,” Bones explained. “Like I think it’s my job to talk about certain things that are uncomfortable and when Morgan got in trouble I said ‘hey man, you got to go away for awhile and you got to better yourself. You have to go figure it out because right now it’s not figured out.’ And I got a lot of hate from the Morgan Wallen fans for saying ‘hey, you need to take a break because what you did and what you said was wrong.’ And he apologized, he came back, and then where it flipped on me… a couple days ago I said ‘hey, let’s move on with Morgan, let’s move on and see what he can show us now and what he can advocate for now that he has been through that.’”
Bones continued, “But what’s happening is, people are putting up in click headlines Bobby Bones says move on, that’s not what happened. It’s not what happened at all. I do think that everyone gets the right to move on which they’ve messed up and they come back and now they can prove to us that they have learned from their mistake and that they can move on and actually make sure that others don’t make the same mistake.”
Bones explained, “And I actually called a friend of mine who is a writer last night and I was like ‘hey, what’s happening here? Like how come one of the biggest teammates of trying to be inclusive in all of music. How come one of the biggest teammates is getting beat up.’ He was like ‘you know it’s the move on part.’ And I was like well let me go on the air and see how it was misconstrued and explain what I meant by it. Cause I do think and I do hope we could move on. I do, honest to God, I don’t back down from that because I think with moving on you actually can move to a better place. Now if you move backward then you gotta move out. That’s a whole different thing.”
“So that situation happened and I wasn’t going to talk about it yesterday because I thought I don’t want to bring up something super sensitive that everyone’s going to fight me over from both sides cause that’s what happens,” Bones continued to explain. “I feel like I’m always the guy on both sides who are like well you’re not jumping on our side completely but I feel like I came in this morning and that’s what I wanted to say. I do believe it, I do believe we can…. Now you can have your opinion if he should win a CMA or not and I get to have my opinion. He’s been penalized, he can’t win awards like Entertainer Of The Year, he can’t win. Some people believe he shouldn’t win any award. I don’t believe that, my heart says I think he has returned, is better. I know some stuff that he’s done and I know some stuff that he’s doing coming up, but it’s not my story to tell and I haven’t spoken to Morgan one time, but I’m not going to be lumped in with ‘oh he said to move on, he’s your typical white person.’ I’m not going to be lumped in with that group.”
Amy Brown added, “we were here for the whole conversation, so I feel like it was very clear to me that you weren’t implying ‘oh let’s just move on and get over this, it’s time to forget about it.’ You were clearly saying ‘look if he’s done the work and now he can come back from this, we can move on and hopefully we’ll go in the right direction. He’s grown, he can help others grow and learn.’ I thought that was very clear.”
“So, that’s the situation and this will never make the memes, this conversation will never make the memes. The clarity never makes the memes. But good luck to the CMAs and the Board [of Directors]. I still feel musically the same, I still feel and hope we can move on but no one says just move on and skip over it and not remember it and not work from it,” Bones added, before concluding his clarification, “Apparently I wasn’t clear enough. I just work too hard at what I do for that to be something that sticks to me because I am the opposite of that. And not just artists of color, female artists… I felt like I never belonged, so I try to make sure everybody gets a shot to belong.”
Click above to watch and hear his full discussion clarifying his comments.
The clarification comes after Bones opened up about Wallen being deemed ineligible from winning an award at this year’s CMA Awards ceremony. He chatted with Amy Brown and producer Eddie about Wallen being snubbed from the ballot and even admitted that everyone deserves a second chance.
“Morgan Wallen’s not allowed to win a CMA himself but he’s allowed if he wrote a song and the song gets it. Like he can win it with other people because they didn’t want to eliminate the other people,” Bones previously explained before adding, “So, there’s a group of people that are fighting to make sure he wins nothing, even if he was it.”
“Why?” Brown asked, before Bones replied, “that’s what I said, I said ‘move on.’ If he is going to go away, come back and go ‘hey I feel good, I’ve some mistakes, I’ve made a big mistake. Let me try to move forward,’ he can’t win a single award, that just doesn’t seem like a fight that’s worth fighting.”
“No, not at all and it seems exhausting,” Brown added. “Now if he was displaying other behavior that didn’t seem like he felt like he wanted to repair anything then okay, I guess put a little effort into that. But I mean I just don’t understand that at all and for other people to be attached to him to be like ‘oh great…’”
“Let’s say he writes ‘Mary Had A Little Lamb’ and there four writers on it and that song wins song of the year, can the other three still win and he just not even get it as a songwriter? But he should,” Bones admitted.
“He should get it, it’s work,” Eddie commented.
Bones also explained that while it is a sensitive situation, he knows that Wallen went away and worked on himself long enough to come back and be a better person and that he has been penalized more then enough.
“It is definitely a sensitive situation but with me, the guy went away for a long time,” the Breaking Bobby Bones star explained. “He said hey i’m going to go and do XYZ and come back and be a better person because of it. I’m taken him for his word. The problem with living in glass houses and throwing stones is that you’re going to get one back at you. And so, Let the guy… if he wins a songwriters award, if he wins.. you got to let him have the award and I hope, hopefully that CMA doesn’t get bullied into being like oh we got to be… cause he’s already been penalized, he can’t win an award by himself.”
“So like when is enough time?” Brown asked before Bones said, “Are we going to ban him from watching the show? You know Morgan Wallen cannot watch the show this year. Put a blindfold on him.” Bones later adding, “Come on. I’m a big believer in second chances, i’ve had a few. When I got fined a million dollars by the FCC, there’s no reason I should’ve been back on the air, except for people said ‘hey, he’s an idiot but he’s our idiot and we believe in him.’”
He concluded the discussion with a PSA to the Board Of Directors at CMA, “If I could say something to the CMA Board, don’t listen to vocal minority, listen to the silent majority, who’s going ‘let’s just have our show.’”
Bones requests that the whole country music community just come together and move on until they are told otherwise.
“Let’s all just hold hands, the whole country music community and move on until we are told not to. If he comes out and does something else ridiculous, then we kind of have to re-evaluate and go well ok maybe this isn’t for him.”
“He’s going [to go on] to be a massive star,” Bones added. “He’s going to win every award from now on, and then that’s it. The end. Thank you for coming to my Ted Talk folks.”
Bones discussion about Wallen comes after the CMA Awards deemed Wallen ineligible for certain awards earlier this year.
In late May 2021, the Country Music Association revealed Wallen’s eligibility for the upcoming CMA Awards, in which the board of directors decided that the “Sand In My Boots” singer is able to be nominated for awards that recognize his musical work, including Album Of The Year, Song Of The Year and more, “so as to not limit the opportunity for other credited collaborators.”
However, according to CMA spokesperson Catharine McNelly, the CMA board of directors also deemed Wallen ineligible for nominations in categories that recognize the artist individually like Entertainer Of The Year and Male Vocalist Of The Year.
Additionally, the nationally syndicated radio host previously opened up about Wallen on air during The Bobby Bones Show, explaining that while he is a supporter of Wallen and his music, he is also an advocate for the country superstar to go away for a while to seek the help he needs while also learning about himself.
“I like Morgan Wallen as a person. This, I don’t like one bit,” Bones said. “I’m also not a big cancel culture guy. But I am a go-away-for-a-while guy… He’s got a lot of self-evaluation to do. A lot. I think he knows that… I am an advocate of Morgan going away for a while. But I’m also an advocate of him learning and coming back and being able to help others. The only way you become not an idiot is by learning why you are an idiot.”
See the video from early February when Bones’ previously spoke out on the Wallen situation above.
