Why can't Nashville give up on Morgan Wallen?

16:02Why can't Nashville give up on Morgan Wallen?

Country superstar Morgan Wallen is dominating the charts right now, less than two years after he was caught on video drunkenly shouting a racial slur. Today's group chat deals with the big question: why hasn't Nashville given up on Morgan Wallen?

Morgan Wallen is country music's biggest star right now.

Currently, half of the top ten songs on the Billboard Hot 100 chart are his, including the No. 1 spot with his new song, Last Night. He even surpassed Drake's record for the most songs on the Hot 100 at one time.

He put out his latest album One Thing At A Time last week, and it went straight to the top of the Billboard 200 albums chart. Not to mention his previous album, 2021's Dangerous, is still in the top 10 on the same chart.

That's overwhelming popularity for any artist, but such a warm reception is especially surprising given the kind of stories that have landed Wallen in the news as of late.

In 2021, the country singer was caught on a neighbour's camera drunkenly shouting the "N-word."

For a little while, it seemed like he might face very serious career consequences, but a couple of years later all seems to be forgiven — possibly even forgotten.

Writers Andrea Williams and Maura Johnston joined host Elamin Abdelmahmoud to get into why exactly Nashville can't seem to give up on Morgan Wallen.

You can listen to the full discussion from today's show on CBC Listen or on our podcast, Commotion with Elamin Abdelmahmoud, available wherever you get your podcasts.