Aaron Watson lit Warren Zeiders up on TikTok in a way you just don’t see in country music.
Heck, his “Tailgate Talk” is rare in any genre.
- Aaron Watson is a veteran Texas music hitmaker whose Underdog album debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard Country Albums chart in 2015.
- Zeiders is a relative newcomer who took “Pretty Little Poison” to No. 1 in 2024. His most recent album is Relapse, Lies & Betrayal.
- The conversation seems to stem from Zeiders recently kicking a fan out of his show after the fan gave him the middle finger.
Without mentioning Zeiders by name — he calls him “Wilbur Zayderhoffer” — Watson criticizes what happened on stage in Florida, after he provides some personal backstory.
“I met Wilbur a couple of years ago. He was alright,” Watson says casually from the tailgate of a pickup truck. He’s snacking on microwave popcorn and occasionally sipping from a can of A&W root beer throughout the dialogue.
“He was a little hoity-toity, if you ask me.”
“Unfortunately I’ve had some of Wilbur’s posts come across my feed. This one, y’all, Wilbur’s got his shirt off and he’s all oily and he’s all leaning back with his shirt off. He’s got his head to his side and he’s kind of gritting his jaw you know and his hair is draped across his nipple. And the top button of his britches is strategically unbuttoned.”
Zeiders is known to post photos of himself shirtless on social media. Often they’re snapped during or after a workout, or as part of a larger carousel that includes concert pics.
The exchange between Zeiders and the fan he kicked out of his show was caught on video. One angle matches Watson’s description pretty closely. He is responding to a fan who flipped him off, and he does use the “P word” and the “F word.”
It was all too much for Watson.
“He flipped you off. He basically held up a spoon and Wilbur, you’re up there on the stage in the spotlight and you whipped out a machete,” he says.
After a a brand partnership suggestion that served as a personal insult, he advises Zeiders to treat fans better than that, because there are many hard-working artists who’d love to be on the stage, too. Then he also gives some life advice.
“Wilbur, for starters, put your shirt on. And stop wearing your hoodie in the house,” he says.
The video has more than 1.2 million views on TikTok in barely a day. Zeiders has not yet commented directly, but several days ago he posted a gallery to Instagram with a caption that begins with, “World likes to throw a few stones y’all and I’m feeling it.”
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Gallery Credit: Billy Dukes
