Former Mumford and Sons founder defends Jason Aldean, 'Sound of Freedom' from media attacks: 'Diabolical'

Mumford and Sons co-founder and podcast host Winston Marshall discussed the "so-called controversy" around Jason Aldean’s music video, "Try That in a Small Town," and praised the hit movie "Sound of Freedom" in an interview with Fox News Digital. 

Marshall faced intense media criticism in 2021 after he tweeted out in favor of conservative author Andy Ngo’s tell-all book on the violent group Antifa. Two years later, Marshall told Fox News Digital that Aldean was suffering from "cancel culture" but also from something deeper and more important. 

"I think this speaks actually to something a bit more profound. I think this speaks to two versions of America," he said. 

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One side of America "sees race, slavery, [as] the original sin [and] systemic racism in everything." The other side believes that it’s "possible to reconcile the dark history of America with the honorable, remarkable, brilliant history of America," he argued.

The clash of those worldviews is difficult to watch, Marshall said, even as a non-American citizen and "an outsider."

"I love this country," Marshall continued. "And I'm frustrated to see the discord." 

Marshall argued that the reconciliation between those two competing visions of America has been accomplished in music before. "Johnny Cash had a song called Ragged Old Flag. And in that song," he said, "[Cash] tells the history of America, good and bad, and that that's all tied in with the flag." 

But pro-America and pro-unity messages like that have been lost in the media feeding frenzy around Aldean’s music video, Marshall said, pointing out that Aldean's video, song and lyrics all speak out "against crime, against violence, against sucker punching strangers in the street, against holding up liquor stores, against spitting at cops, against [despoiling] the American flag."

The banjoist and musician spoke out on the cancel culture and free speech controversy surrounding Aldean's cancelation by the media. 

"So, yes, there's a kind of culture thing here, and there is a free speech issue as well, which is that young artists who might agree with Aldean but don't have the money or clout will learn to self-censor," because, Marshall said, "if they put their head above the parapet, there are consequences."

"And it's that unfortunately, there are gatekeepers in the music industry which keep between artists and the people. The people, obviously they vote with their ears, they don't give a d---. They either like it or they don't. There's two types of music, good music and bad music. But it's not the case that young artists will be totally free to speak their mind if they choose."

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The musician, who now hosts the podcast "Marshall Matters," also pushed back on celebrities who have claimed that Aldean’s video was promoting violence. 

"[Aldean's video] has been interpreted by many, including singers like Sheryl Crow, as promotion of violence. Now, I remember the heady days of the summer of 2020 when silence was violence. Well, now it seems that decrying violence is now promoting violence," Marshall said, adding that he "can't keep up" with the changing media narratives around anti-police riots in American cities. 

One particularly "ludicrous" media claim is that Aldean’s video is linked to the lynching of Henry Coates in 1927. 

"Of course that's heinous," Marshall said, "but it's supreme bad faith to assume that Aldean even knew that, let alone would have chosen that location intentionally for that. That would be as ludicrous as assuming that the up and coming ‘Little Shop of Horrors’ production at Ford's Theater in DC is somehow linked to the assassination of Abraham Lincoln. It's absurd." 

Marshall connected the "media coverage" of Aldean’s video to the hit movie "Sound of Freedom." 

"I think more alarming, if we're going to talk about current events, is the treatment of the "Sound of Freedom" film, because this is even more shocking. This is a film about child sex slavery, the great atrocity of our time. Millions of kids sold into sex slavery."

"Sound of Freedom" made waves across the country after it beat out the new Indiana Jones movie for top spot at the box office. Marshall said that he saw the film about a week ago.

"The whole theater was in tears and erupted into applause at the end, at the creation of this film," he said, recounting his experience. "Now the media, the left wing media, the Guardian, they just link it to QAnon. Rolling Stone has done something similar." 

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Marshall was especially critical of a Vox review of the film that nearly equated child sex trafficking with right-wing "extremist propaganda." 

"Sound of Freedom is ultimately a form of extremist propaganda — and that extremism is at least as dark and dangerous as the very thing Sound of Freedom wants to combat," Vox wrote in a story from July 14.

"Are you utterly insane?" Marshall said, responding to the article. "For me, that's where you see [that] some of the liberal media have just completely lost it. That, for me, is morally just so bankrupt that it beggars belief. I urge anyone to go and watch that film and then go and read the Vox.com review and not be startled and offended. It's just appalling."

Marshall, who identifies as a "liberal in a British sense," acknowledged that even those who consider themselves progressives are not always well represented by liberal media outlets.

"It might be the case that some of these rags, like Rolling Stone and Vox, are not really representing progressives and not really representing liberals. I'm not actually sure what their viewerships are. Certainly CNN's viewership has gone down."

He continued: "So it might be that they're so out of touch now that they don't really represent one side of America. They just represent an elite bubble of diabolical sons of Cain."

Marshall applauded the team behind Sound of Freedom on Twitter Wednesday. 

"A packed cinema and applause at the end. I’ve never experienced that before[.] Everyone watch it[.] God’s Children are not for sale!" he wrote, quoting from a key line from the film. 

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Fox News’ Cortney O’Brien contributed to this report.