Jason Aldean dropped his highly anticipated tenth studio album, Macon, Georgia, on Friday (April 22). Stacked with an extensive track listing – 20 new songs and 10 re-released live versions of select hits – the double album features tunes for just about every mood.
But, perhaps the most sentimental of them all is a song titled “Your Mama.” Aldean couldn’t turn his mind away from the idea of recording the track because he says that its lyrics play out like a letter to his only son, four-year-old Memphis Aldean Williams, whom he shares with his wife Brittany Aldean.
“For me, that song is probably the most personal thing that I’ve ever recorded. It’s a song that is so out of left field for me because it’s not simply the kind of thing that I would cut. But when I heard it, to me, it’s more of a letter to my son,” Aldean told Music Mayhem. “I have three daughters who are amazing, but I have one son. And, to me, it was more of a song for him about his mom, Brit. To me, that was kind of where it came from. And the lyrics were originally ‘came from California,’ so I changed that to Carolina because that’s where she’s from. So, yeah, that one’s pretty personal, but I cut that specifically for my son and for my wife.”
“Your Mama,” penned by Troy Verges, Ben West, Josh Miller, and Florida Georgia Line’s Tyler Hubbard, was initially written for Hubbard’s expected child when his wife Hayley Hubbard was pregnant. But, due to unanticipated circumstances, the tune found its way to Aldean.
“Whenever we’re cutting a new album, he’ll hit me up and send me a few songs that he’s got,” Aldean said of Hubbard during a recent interview with Today’s Country Radio host Kelleigh Bannen on Apple Music Country. “He had just written a song. His wife was pregnant and they were having a little boy, or at least they were told they were having a little boy. So Tyler goes in and he writes this song. Well, fast-forward, he finds out that that little boy is not a little boy. It’s a little girl. So, he was going to cut this song for his little boy but ended up having a little girl.”
Macon, Georgia, produced by Michael Knox, is named after Aldean’s hometown, and “represents the first chunk of time since he was a teen that he was not hopping from city to city each night.” Aldean released the first half of his double album, Macon, in November of 2021, and that portion of the project features his award-winning, chart-topping duet with Carrie Underwood, “If I Didn’t Love You,” Wallen co-penned, “The Sad Songs,” and a special cover version of Bryan Adams’ June 1985 hit, “Heaven.”
Meanwhile, some of the highlights on Georgia include new releases, “Rock and Roll Cowboy,” “Whiskey Me Away,” and “God Made Airplanes” as well as older hits like, “Burnin’ It Down,” and “Any Ol’ Barstool.”
Of his hometown, Aldean says, “I loved it, man. It was kind of the perfect place for me. It wasn’t really in a big city, at least the part of town I grew up in wasn’t really a big city. I was kind of more on the outskirts in a rural part of town and grew up playing sports, playing baseball, and just kind of having a normal childhood.”
“I still have a lot of friends there that live there, a lot of my family is still there. And, for me, a kid who loved to hunt, fish, and play sports and do all those things, it was actually the perfect hometown for me,” he added.
The three-time ACM Entertainer of the Year, who, along with Memphis, shares his youngest daughter Navy Rome Williams with wife, Brittany, and has two daughters from a previous marriage – Keeley and Kendyl Williams, also opened up about raising his kids. He expressed his wishes to give them a sense of normalcy despite his celebrity status.
“I was raised to be respectful and use manners and ‘Yes, sir,’ ‘no, sir,’ ‘yes ma’am,’ those kinds of things. I think you probably see that a little more in the South, but I think you’re going to raise your kids the way you were raised. So those kinds of things, I’m kind of a stickler for. But, I want them to have a normal childhood, wanting them to get involved in things, whether it be sports or whatever it is, even though the life that I have is crazy and whatever, I want them to enjoy being kids and have a normal childhood,” he shared.
This summer, Aldean will take the road for his headlining Rock N’ Roll Cowboy Tour. The 34-city trek will launch July 15th in Scranton, PA, with special guests Gabby Barrett, John Morgan, and Dee Jay Silver.
