All three occupy the top spots on the Billboard Hot 100

Jason Aldean, Morgan Wallen and Luke Combs have made Billboard history with their latest singles. Aldean’s “Try That In a Small Town” tops the chart while Morgan Wallen’s “Last Night” and Luke Combs’ “Fast Car” follow in the second and third spots, respectively. It’s the first time in the chart’s 65-year history that the top three spots are country artists/songs, according to Billboard.

Aldean’s song — written by Kelley Lovelace, Neil Thrasher, Tully Kennedy and Kurt Michael Allison — gives a conventional take on protecting yourself, property and neighbors. In the song, Aldean sings, “Got a gun that my granddad gave me / They say one day they’re gonna round up / Well, that shit might fly in the city, good luck.”

It was originally released in May, but began ascending to the top last month after its video attracted negative media attention. In the three minute clip, Aldean and his band perform in front of the Maury County Courthouse in Tennessee, where Henry Choate, a black man, was lynched in 1927. The courthouse is draped with an American flag over the entrance. The performance is interspersed with real news footage of violence and looting from around the world, including the BLM footage projected at least once onto the exterior of the courthouse.

Many, including fellow artists Jason Isbell and Sheryl Crow, have accused the outspoken country star of being racist and promoting gun violence with the song’s message and video’s imagery. Others, such as Brantley Gilbert, Ted Nugent, Cody Johnson, Lee Greenwood and Jake Owen, have shown support for Aldean.

Aldean has defended the clip on social media and in concert, recently telling a Cincinnati, OH crowd, “I feel like everyone’s entitled to their opinion. You can think something all you want to, that doesn’t mean it’s true, right? So, what I am is a proud American. I’m proud to be from here. I love our country. I wanna see it restored to what it once was before all this bullshit started happening to us. I love my country, I love my family, and I will do anything to protect that. I can tell you that right now.”

The video has since been re-edited to remove the BLM clips. “The video footage was edited due to third party copyright clearance issues,” Aldean’s label, BBR Music Group, says in a statement.

Due to the backlash, CMT pulled the clip, but the controversy only caused more interest in the track from conservatives and supporters of the country star. The song quickly skyrocketed up the charts and drew more than 23 million viewers to its video on YouTube. Luminate reports the song’s streams drew 30.7 million, up 165%, and received more than 8.8 million radio spins during the week of July 21-27. The track was also named the fourth best-selling song of 2023.

In late June, Wallen and Combs made history on the chart with their respective singles reaching the top two spots. It marked the first time in 42 years country hits reached the top two spots on the Billboard Hot 100, following Eddie Rabbit and Dolly Parton in 1981.