Chase Rice Faces Backlash After Joking About COVID to Promote His New Single

Taylor Cole /
Chase Rice Faces Backlash After Joking About COVID to Promote His New Single

Chase Rice teamed up with Florida Georgia Line on Monday (Nov. 30) for his new song, "Drinkin' Beer. Talkin' God. Amen.," but was met with criticism when he promoted the song by joking that he has coronavirus.

"Just lost my taste and smell. Weird," he tweeted on Sunday, referring to a common COVID-19 symptom. "Also, dropping a single at midnight."

"On a real note. Don’t have covid," he clarified in another tweet. "But I’m dropping a single tonight. With 2 guys that I learned a lot from. Respect the hell out of @FLAGALine. And 10 years after we started doing music together and lived together, we’re at it again. Drinkin beer. Talkin God. Amen."

His promotional tactic, however, was not received well by fans, who called out the country singer for being insensitive to the 267,000 American lives taken by the novel coronavirus (and to his collaborator Tyler Hubbard, who was recently tested positive for the disease). Many also referred to a similarly inconsiderate incident earlier this summer, when Rice held a controversial show at Petros' historic Brushy Mountain State Penitentiary outside of Nashville, with zero social distancing or mask wearing.

"Really in bad taste to joke about Covid," one user wrote. "Thought you had learned something since the concert incident this year. Guess not. Here’s an idea: take all the earnings from this song and donate to Covid survivors or donate PPE to local hospitals. Do better, Covid is not a joke."

"Yeah you've been flagrantly disregarding public health regulations during a pandemic... Super weird..." another added.

See reactions below.

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