Don’t You Think This Post Malone Bit’s Done Got Outta Hand

Random Notes 47 Comments

photo via Bud Light


I don’t need Post Malone playing The Bluebird Cafe. I don’t need Post Malone screwing up Joe Diffie covers with HARDY and Morgan Wallen on the CMA Awards. I don’t need Post Malone shutting down Lower Broadway in the middle of the damn day to record some lame music video with Luke Combs. I don’t want to see Bryan Sutton backing Post Malone as he makes heart hands to the crowd at Marathon Music Works in an “exclusive” party produced to be a commercial for Bud Light as part of the brand’s rehabilitation campaign.

Post Malone, Post Malone, Post Malone. His “country” album F-1 Trillion isn’t even out for another month (August 16th), and he’s already dominating the narrative at a time when country music was finally dominating much of the narrative in popular music all on its own, and with some of the best music it’s produced in the last 20 years.

This whole thing started with Post Malone wearing Colter Wall and Tyler Childers T-shirts, hyping up Billy Strings, and covering Sturgill Simpson. And hey, I will be the first to admit that his promotion of cool country artists and the prospects of making a country album were promising. Don’t discount that some of this Post Malone activity probably clued people into the presence of country music you’ll never hear on corporate country radio, or see on the CMA Awards, and did these artists and the rest of us a bit of good. Hats off to him.

But the two “country” songs we’ve heard from Post Malone so far have featured Morgan Wallen and Blake Shelton—public enemy #1 and #2 to many true country music fans. They may be catchy as hell, but they’re otherwise pretty lame. When Post Malone’s “country” album does come out, my guess is with 18 tracks, there’s probably going to be some good stuff on it. There also may be some cool collaborations with some actual country artists, maybe Billy Strings or Sierra Ferrell, or both. Hell, at this point there better be after all the garbage we’ve endured during the preamble.

But this all feels like a big distraction at a time when we were finally on a big winning streak in country. Now we’ve got to contend with this pop superstar wanting to soak of some of the popularity built off the hard work of country artists. It’s no longer about country music needing Post Malone to hype it, it’s about Post Malone needing country to hype him. And that’s what’s happening at the expense of all the great music coming out right now as the media and public gravitate towards the shiniest object—or in this case, the one with the most face tattoos.

Don’t take this as “gatekeeping” necessarily. If Post Malone wants to make a country album, he has every right to. But it feels like we’re heading towards the same false alarm we had with Beyoncé, which still has people tripped up in believing she made a country album. All the stuff we’ve heard so far from Posty’s F-1 Trillion album would be fair to slot as Southern pop at best. It’s probably fair to expect that to be the lion’s share of the project. It’s also all been very much within the American major label system, and the corporate brand mainstream.

Oh, and please spare us the “Yeah, but he’s from Grapevine, Texas.” This was the same silly notion about how Beyoncé must be country because she’s from Houston. If being from Texas immediately bequeaths you the birthright to make country music, that also must mean that people not from Texas, the Deep South, or the American West are somehow inferior at making country music. Try telling that mess to Flint, Michigan’s Whitey Morgan.

But one thing that Post Malone probably has on Beyoncé is that he’s actually trying. Perhaps he’s trying too much, and that is the concern here. But where Post is making all of these appearances and doing all of these collaborations to make a buzz, Beyoncé’s Cowboy Carter now sits at #51 on the album charts, despite all the media hype and 27 tracks. It’s likely F-1 Trillion will be stuck in the Top 10 in the Billboard Albums chart for the next two years.

But herein lies another dilemma for country since this will cast a shadow over country music’s native performers. The massive single with Morgan Wallen “I Had Some Help” is already doing this. Since Zach Bryan released his last album The Great American Bar Scene on a Thursday—giving it only one day of streaming data—and Zach didn’t wait around for physical product to be made, its chart performance was terrible. It also doesn’t help that it didn’t have a big hit single.

Some have pointed out how when Beyoncé’s Cowboy Carter was released, there was much push back, but when White performers from the pop/hip-hop world such as Jelly Roll and Post Malone show up, they’re embraced. There is probably a little truth to that. But to many in country music, it’s not the skin color that matters, it’s the music. If Post Malone had shown up performing actual country music with Billy Strings and Tyler Childers as opposed to Blake Shelton and Morgan Wallen, we may be singing a different tune.

Meanwhile, on Friday, July 19th, long-time singer, upright bass player, and songwriter Melissa Carper released her latest album called Borned In Ya (read review). The title track was inspired by a quote from Dr. Ralph Stanley about how the music had to be “Borned in ya” for you to sing it and play it.

All around the United States and world, young boys and girls from all regions and of all ethnicities get inspired at a tender age to play country music, some as side players, some as solo artists, some that just want to be songwriters. Then they set out towards that goal as their life’s purpose, never taking their eye off that mark, or waffling from that objective, often sacrificing, sometimes struggling in obscurity to make that dream happen. So feel like they were born to do it.

These are the performers who should be country music’s center of attention. As great as it is to see so much attention being paid to country music these days, it’s important that it goes to the right places. And as much as outside media loves to say that country music needs performers like Beyonce, Post Malone, or whomever else to be relevant in the modern entertainment landscape, country has never focused on being relevant or popular, aside from the performers who are more pop than country anyway.

Country music is only focused on being country. Let the popularity come and go, and let the creatures of pop be the ones to obsess over world domination.

© 2025 Saving Country Music

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