A 20-foot neon sign bearing Morgan Wallen’s name will not be built in downtown Nashville due to the country singer’s controversial past.
Morgan Wallen’s This Bar & Tennessee Kitchen will open in downtown Nashville this weekend and permission was required from the Nashville Metro Council before installation began on the restaurant’s sign.
But the council voted overwhelmingly against installing the sign, and many took offense at the prospect of announcing the name of a person who has been in trouble with the law and used racial slurs.
The motion was rejected by 30 councilors, and only three voted in favor of the sign, according to The Tennessean. Four councilors abstained.
“I don’t want to see a sign with the name of a person who throws chairs off balconies and says racial slurs,” said at-large council member Delishia Porterfield, according to the outlet.
A 20-foot sign bearing Morgan Wallen’s name will not be built in downtown Nashville due to the country singer’s controversial past.
A mockup of the sign for the restaurant, which will open in Nashville this weekend.
Councilman Jordan Huffman also agreed with his statements, according to WSMV.com.
“I am opposed to this,” he said. ‘Number 1: Mr. Wallen is from East Tennessee and he gives us all a bad name. His comments are hateful, harmful, and as far as I’m concerned, you don’t belong in this town. I’m tired of this city bending over backwards to make anyone happy who makes whatever comment they want. We continue on this path. I encourage my colleagues to vote against.’
Even the resolution’s sponsor, Jacob Kupin of the 19th Ward, had reservations about the sign. “It struck me that we were putting a sign in the center with the name of someone who has not been a good actor,” he said.
“I decided to seek approval for this because I support the efforts to move this bar forward…the restaurant group that runs this facility, TC Restaurant Group, has been a really good partner in everything going on downtown,” he added.
TC Restaurant Group, the company that opened the restaurant, also operates other restaurants named after iconic country singers, including Jason Aldean’s Kitchen & Rooftop Bar and Casa Rosa Miranda Lambert’s.
Morgan Wallen’s This Bar & Tennessee Kitchen is scheduled to open Memorial Day weekend.
Last month, Wallen was arrested after throwing a chair from a rooftop bar in downtown Nashville.
Wallen was charged with three counts of felony reckless endangerment and one count of misdemeanor disorderly conduct, and officers alleged the chair landed three feet away from them.
Wallen faced major backlash in 2021 when TMZ posted a video of the singer saying the N-word to one of his friends after a night out.
The restaurant is being opened by a third-party establishment, TC Restaurant Group.
After footage of Wallen using the racial slur went viral, many radio stations stopped playing his music and the Country Music Association removed Wallen’s appearances from their platforms.
Her songs were removed from featured playlists on Apple Music, Pandora and Spotify due to the sandal.
Wallen’s record label, Big Loud, indefinitely suspended its recording contract with him.
The Academy of Country Music announced that Wallen and his most recent album at the time, Dangerous: The Double Album, would be ineligible for the 56th annual Academy of Country Music Awards.
Last month, Wallen made headlines after throwing a chair at police from a rooftop bar in downtown Nashville; pictured November 2023
In the week following racism, Dangerous’ album sales increased and digital sales increased more than 100 percent.
It even stayed at the top of the Billboard charts for seven more weeks.
In April 2021, Wallen donated $300,000 to the Black Music Action Coalition on behalf of 20 people who had advised him after he used the racial slur.
Wallen spoke publicly about his comments on Good Morning America on July 23, where he said he “was with some of his friends and they were talking nonsense together” and said he “was wrong” to say those words.
