It’s been nearly eight years since Stephen Paddock fired over 1,000 rounds into the Route 91 Harvest music festival in Las Vegas. Sadly, the mass shooting took the lives of 60 people and injured over 800 more. At the time of the shooting, Jason Aldean performed on stage during what seemed like just another show. But he soon found himself and his band in danger as bullets ripped through the crowd. Now, years later, Aldean opened up about the incident and the mental toll the shooting had on him.
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Appearing on the Armchair Expert podcast with Dax Shepard, Aldean explained how he had little time to process the shooting. Having a packed schedule, the singer was expected to perform on Saturday Night Live. And shortly after that performance, he was back on the road, returning to Las Vegas. “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. People hadn’t recovered from their wounds yet.”
Throughout his busy schedule, Aldean recalled returning home to his family. “We finally got out of there the next afternoon, home and you’re just glad to be home, show up my mom’s crying. You know, my oldest daughter was in school, freaking out, thinking that somebody was trying to shoot us, so all the details were still kind of coming out.” Jump to the 49:00 mark to hear Aldean’s comments.
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Jason Aldean Admits “We Got So Lucky”
Outside of the incident, Aldean and his wife, Brittany Aldean, welcomed their son, Memphis, only two months after the shooting. It was at that time, the emotions surrounding the entire tragedy started to hit the singer. “I kind of had a breakdown in my house one day. It was after my son was born and just all that heaviness of everything, just getting laid on you.” He added, “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.”
Although Aldean and his band were able to get off stage unharmed, Aldean revealed that a bullet was found lodged in his bass player’s instrument. “For our little family, our little crew, we got so lucky, not one injury to any of our guys. And you’re happy about that, but then you’re like, feel guilty to be happy about there’s like this guilt ridden thing.”
While helping raise funds to support the victims, Aldean decided not to go to therapy. Instead, he found peace within his family. “My therapy was me, my wife, my band, all of us that were kind of there. We all talked about it amongst each other.” For Aldean, the tragedy became a reminder of life’s fragility – and of the healing power found in family, faith, and community.
(Photo by John Shearer/Getty Images for CMA)
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