Concert review: NC fans saw a different side of Post Malone — and a whole lot of his legs
Well, that’s not something you see every day.
That being: A bushy-bearded, profanity-spewing, tattooed-from-head-to-toe dude, slinking around a stage in front of 20,000 screaming fans. Wearing a Dallas Cowboys jersey and tight leopard-print shorts with a five-inch inseam. In Crocs. Then barefoot. Singing respectable and catchy country-music songs.
Country-music songs! In tight leopard-print shorts with a five-inch inseam!
Gotta be honest, I’ve never seen a male country-music artist perform a headlining set at PNC Music Pavilion while showing off that much leg.
I wonder what Jimmie Rodgers (the so-called “Father of Country Music”) would have thought if he had risen from the dead Monday afternoon in time to catch Post Malone’s concert at PNC on Monday night.
Or what, say, “Queen of Country” Dolly Parton would think if she had walked into his sh —
Oh, wait. Dolly is on a song that appears on Post’s “F-1 Trillion,” the country crossover album serving as the inspiration for the tour that brought him to Charlotte for the second time in just over five months.
So is NC native Luke Combs. And Brad Paisley. And Chris Stapleton.
This is pretty serious. It’s also pretty new.
His last visit here, in fact, was for a top-of-the-bill gig at uptown’s Lovin’ Life Music Fest, where he did what was by and large a hip-hop show.
Monday night’s was something ... different. Monday night’s was a two-hour extravaganza that dedicated more than half of its run time to Nashvillian selections from “F-1 Trillion” and featured a nine-piece backing band populated by a fiddler, a flat-picking guitarist, and a steel guitarist, among others.
Still, despite leading off his set by performing the album’s first and second tracks in order — “Wrong Ones” (his collab with Tim McGraw) and “Finer Things” (his collab with Hank Williams Jr.) — this was never going to be a traditional country show.
Not just because Post would keep his core fans happy with a steady dose of only-very-mildly-countrified rearrangements of rap, trap and pop songs like “White Iverson,” “Better Now” and “Chemical.”
But, more generally speaking, this was never going to be a traditional country show because Post Malone is Post Malone.
It doesn’t matter whether he’s rapping or singing bluegrass — Post is still Post.
He still spits in the air, still pounds Bud Light from a cup, still sings with a cigarette in his hand; still struts like Mick Jagger, twirls like a toddler, wriggles his butt like a duck, has this just general rubbery-ness about him that reminds me of ’90s-era Jim Carrey.
He still has this tendency to let loose with a ferocious death growl, whether he’s trying to make “Candy Paint” sound terrifying (imagine Sam Kinison screaming “You don’t f------ know me, homie, you don’t want war!!!!”) or simply introducing “CHAAAAAAAAAAD!!!!,” the superfan who was invited up to the stage to play acoustic guitar for Post on “Stay.”
And Post still does all kinds of things that, frankly, most other major-label artists with his level of mainstream appeal would not.
Like sing the last line of the dreamy ballad “I Fall Apart” while lying on his stomach with his head propped up by a microphone pressed hard against his lips and teeth. Or crawl around the stage like a baby — wild-eyed, mouth open, tongue lolling, as plumes of flame and sparkling fireworks signal the climax of “rockstar.”
Or even introduce his white-bearded bass guitarist Craig Young by, essentially, roasting him.
“Some might even say he’s the best bass player they’ve ever heard,” Post said, gesturing to the veteran Nashville session musician. “I’ve never heard anyone say that, but someone could say that. Some say he vetoed Krampus on f------ Christmas. Ladies and gentlemen, every young kid’s nightmare on December 24th.”
I’m sure, by the way, that those comments were meant to be playful and not mean-spirited. If they came off that way, it’s probably only because the rest of the night felt like such a lovefest.
In addition to his catchphrase — “Thank you so very f------ much, ladies and gentlemen,” which as usual he uttered over and over and over and over and over — he launched into several of his famously obscenity-laden motivational self-help speeches.
While teeing up breakup song “Two Hearts”: “I would just like to dedicate it to anyone out there who’s havin’ a rough go, and I just wanted to say: It gets f------ better. Just keep f------ kickin’ ass. ... No matter what the f--- you’re goin’ through. You are loved more than you know, and you’re not f------ alone.”
Before “Losers,” his and Jelly Roll’s ode to underdogs: “If you’re going through anything right now in your life ... if any times you may feel that you’re all by your f------ self and you have no love in your life ... know that I f------ love you, and you are loved by your family and your f------ friends. ... If you feel like a f------ loser, well, I’m a f------ loser, too, and I f------ love you so very f------ much, ladies and gentlemen.”
Near the end of the show: “It’s so easy to get caught up in the mindset that no matter what the f--- happens, no matter what I do, nothing seems to be getting better day by day. And I just wanted to say to anyone who’s going through something: Keep f------ believing in yourself because you are the most bad-ass motherf----- on the f------ planet.”
In a similar vein, but slightly more specifically, Post did also nod to the devastation caused by Hurricane Helene in North Carolina at one point, saying that he “wanted to send my love to anyone whose family may be going through a situation with the storm. ... We love you so very f------ much, and we’re gonna do our part to help out in any way that we can.” (He didn’t indicate when or how, although opener Muscadine Bloodline announced during its set that the band was donating all profits from merchandise sales for the Charlotte show to disaster relief efforts.)
Thunderous cheers followed each of these proclamations, and sometimes even drowned out the ends of them.
As they have at the previous Posty shows I’ve been to, his fans seemed to hang on every one of his slaps at his air guitar, every goofy contortion of his body, every encouraging word, every song — no matter the genre. It was a long, loud, celebratory night.
There was only one time he seemed to lose them.
The Carolina crowd had let it slide that the singer was wearing a Dallas jersey (No. 17, for its placekicker Brandon Aubrey) ... until partway through his set he asked: “Hey, we got any Cowboys fans in here tonight?” Three seconds of smattered cheering were quickly drowned out by seven seconds of full-throated boos.
“Don’t put the Cowboys thing against me,” Post said, hands up. “We can all be f------ friends tonight, right?”
In due time, as the show entered its homestretch, the man known legally as Austin Richard Post pulled the jersey off and tossed it aside, leaving him laid bare: a country singer wearing nothing but tight leopard-print shorts a the five-inch inseam.
Not something you see every day, but something — knowing Post Malone — that we’re likely to see again.
Post Malone’s setlist
1. “Wrong Ones”
2. “Finer Things”
3. “Circles”
4. “What Don’t Belong to Me”
5. “Guy for That”
6. “Chemical”
7. “California Sober”
8. “M-E-X-I-C-O”
9. “Candy Paint”
10. “Who Needs You”
11. “Two Hearts”
12. “Stay”
13. “I Fall Apart”
14. “Better Now”
15. “Psycho”
16. “Dead At The Honky Tonk”
17. “Losers”
18. “Yours”
19. “White Iverson”
20. “Ain’t How It Ends”
21. “Go to Hell”
22. “I Had Some Help”
23. “rockstar”
24. “Congratulations”
Encore:
25. “Sunflower”
