Jason Aldean Recalls Frantic Weeks After Las Vegas Shooting

Jason Aldean knows he will be forever linked to the city of Las Vegas after a gunman killed 60 people and injured hundreds more while he was performing at the Route 91 Harvest Music Festival on October 1, 2017.

Looking back on the tragedy, he recalled coping with the whirlwind in the weeks that followed.

“I ended up having a moment at my house where I kind of broke down thinking about just all the people that I could have lost, all the people that we did lose as far as fans, but my inner circle of people and my wife was there eight months pregnant with my son and all these things,” Aldean, 48, explained in an appearance on the Monday, September 1, episode of the “Armchair Expert” podcast

The days after the shooting included an impromptu trip to New York to appear on Saturday Night Live, then a flight the next morning back to Las Vegas to meet with some of the injured victims recovering in a local hospital.

“I was home for a couple days and I got a call from my manager, Clarence Spalding, and he just goes, ‘Hey, Lorne Michaels just called and he wants you to play Saturday Night Live,’” Aldean recalled. “Obviously, Saturday Night Live is something I’ve always wanted to play. That’s one of those things as an artist or actor, it’s just an iconic show.”

But that didn’t mean Aldean’s answer was an automatic yes. Explaining that he didn’t want to make his SNL debut “like this,” he said that he told the show that he would only do it if he could say and perform what he wanted.

“Me and my publicist sat on the phone in a room in a hotel and wrote out what we were going to say,” he said. “And they let me do it. So I called my band, rallied everybody.”

That Saturday night, October 7, Aldean was centerstage for the show’s cold open, where he delivered a message to the victims and their families.

“I want to say to them, we hurt for you and we hurt with you,” he said at the time. “You can be sure that we’re going to walk through these tough times together every step of the way. Because when America is at its best, our bond, our spirit is unbreakable.”

He then began playing Tom Petty’s “I Won’t Back Down.” Petty died just five days earlier of an accidental overdose at age 66.

“Sunday morning, I was on a flight going back to Las Vegas to go to the hospital and see all the victims. That was tough,” he said. “People hadn’t recovered from their wounds yet.”

Eight years later, Aldean hopes to one day return to Las Vegas for an extended run. He cited the Backstreet Boys’ residency at The Sphere as something that could be a fit for him.

“I think that’s probably in our future to hit Vegas, do some residencies, but for me to just stop touring and even doing it the way we do it,” he said. “This is what I’ve wanted to do from the time I can remember.”