VIDEO: Brad Paisley Defends LL Cool J Duet "Accidental Racist"

Brad Paisley is standing by his controversial duet with LL Cool J, "Accidental Racist."
"I don't know if any of you noticed, but there is some racial tension, here and there," Paisley said on Tuesday's The Ellen DeGeneres Show. "It kind of deals with that and I felt like when we were writing this song, it wasn't necessarily up to the media ... or sort of talk radio or anything like that to deal with that anymore.  I think it's music's turn to have the conversation."

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After its release on Monday, "Accidental Racist" took the Internet by storm as listeners reacted to the provocative lyrics detailing Paisley's struggle with race issues as a white man in the South. The song starts off with Paisley singing about walking into a Starbucks wearing a Confederate flag shirt, "just a proud rebel son with an 'ol can of worms/lookin' like I got a lot to learn.""I'm proud of where I'm from but not everything we've done/And it ain't like you and me can rewrite history," Paisley continues in the chorus.LL eventually responds, rapping: "If you don't judge my do-rag, I won't judge your red flag/If you don't judge my gold chains, I'll forget the iron chains."

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When prompted by Ellen DeGeneres to explain the message of the song, Paisley seemed to struggle with what exactly he and LL were trying to say. "I don't know.  We're sort of asking the question of as a proud Southerner and he is a black New Yorker," Paisley stumbled, before switching gears. "One of my favorite lines in the song, he says, 'I think the relationship between the Mason-Dixon needs some fixing.' Leave it to a rapper to put it so simply and so beautifully.">

Listen to "Accidental Racist" in full here.What do you think of the song?