To say it’s been a crazy 24 hours would be an understatement. If you were too busy paying attention to the history-making election that took place last night, the ongoing saga between Zach Bryan and Brianna Chickenfry took an unexpected turn with her fellow podcast host, Dave Portnoy, and Josh Richards teaming up to drop a diss track on Bryan.
The diss track, loosely titled after Taylor Swift’s “The Smallest Man Who Ever Lived,” took an incredible amount of shots at the “Something in the Orange” singer. From likening Bryan to a Tyler Childers clone, to mentioning his alleged cheating on his ex-wife, Rose Elisabeth Madden, to seemingly confirming the rumor that Bryan was too drunk to perform at the second night of Noah Kahan’s Fenway Park show, the pair did not hold back in the slightest.
A plethora of Bryan’s songs, “I Remember Everything,” “Revival,” “Pink Skies” and “Oklahoma Smokeshow” were also referenced throughout the diss track.
It seems as if Bryan’s label, Warner Music Group, hit “Smallest Man” with a copyright strike a few hours after it was up, which prompted the Barstool founder to tweet, “Zach Bryan and @warnermusic must have the worst crisis management execs in the world. Running around like chickens with their heads cut off trying to erase #smallestman from the internet. Did nobody tell them I run an internet company? They just guaranteed this thing hits #1″
The diss track would later be made avaliable on YouTube for a few hours before getting struck down a second time. However, it is available on all streaming platforms now.
Whether it was the diss track itself or the division that inherently comes with a major election (my money’s on both), Bryan took to his Instagram this evening to post a story with the caption, “Worlds been a bit heavy lately, new music tonight”
No one really knew what to expect given Bryan’s sporadic release history. Was it a single? Was it an EP? What followed was the release of “This World’s A Giant,” a song that had been teased on social media in early 2023.
Obviously, “This World’s A Giant” is not a response to Portnoy and Richard’s diss track and is instead a reflection on appreciating the peace found in small moments of life during hard times. With arguably some of the most dynamic production in any of his songs to date, Bryan leans heavily into the alternative/indie style that he’s been flirting with on tracks like “Boys of Faith” and “Tourniquet” during the back half of the song.
Listen here: