As Post Malone gears up for his blockbuster 2026 Big Ass Stadium Tour with Jelly Roll, some fans are wondering whether his latest setlist will lean towards the hazy trap of his earlier material or his more recent traditional-leaning country era.

One thing is for sure, though - Post will be backed by a live band, eschewing the pre-recorded tracks of his shows in the mid-2010s. As he explained to NPR during his Tiny Desk performance back in 2023, incorporating a live band has been a freeing experience.

When asked how performing with live instrumentation compares to singing along to pre-recorded tracks, Post underlines that it's really no comparison, “It's night and day. I don't know, you feel more a part of something performance-wise. I have, like, such a talented group of musicians, and they play the s*** out of their instruments...It just adds a little more camaraderie to the whole thing”.

He adds that the social element is important, “It's just cool to be there, like, all together. It's just a big hang out. But it's nice to know I can look back and be like, ‘Hey guys’”.

What's fascinating about these comments is that they arrived a year before Post had dropped the first single from his debut country project, F-1Trillion. And what's more, Post started using a live band in 2019 around the rollout of Hollywood's Bleeding.

Before that, for the tours around beerbongs & bentleys and Stoney, the ‘I Had Some Help’ hitmaker largely opted for pre-recorded tracks, in order for him to capture the heavily processed vocal effects and atmospheric ambience of both those projects.

Although Hollywood's Bleeding was still grounded in trap, it explored rock influences for the first time, and felt, in many ways, like the beginning of Post's shift towards a more guitar-driven sound, which came through most lucidly on the indie-folk of AUSTIN. It feels apt, therefore, that Post's first Tiny Desk came in honour of that project.

As a result, even before he dived wholeheartedly into country music with F-1Trillion and the accompanying Long Bed deluxe record, Post was performing more pared-down renditions of early trap anthems like ‘rockstar’, ‘Psycho’ and ‘White Iverson’.

The crucial difference is, now, Post uses The Fools For You as his backing band, featuring a host of leading instrumentalists within the country scene, including Chandler Walters, a fast-emerging artist and a key collaborator across F-1Trillion.

They have helped Posty to hone a decidedly Western, honky-tonkin’ sound, epitomised by his wonderfully twangy performances of ‘M-E-X-I-C-O’ and ‘What Don't Belong to Me’.

It remains to be seen how Post will balance all the spectrums of his sound for his expansive 2026 Big Ass Stadium Tour, but given the fact that Jelly and Carter Faith are the openers, we suspect his North America run will remain primarily country-infused. For Asia, Australia and New Zealand, rapper Don Toliver is the support, perhaps signalling that these shows will be considerably more trap-leaning.

With Post's new album, The Eternal Buzz, set to be a sprawling double-album, we have an inkling that he'll be satisfying both areas of his fanbase with one side being country, and the other being an homage to the now-iconic sound of his first projects. Post hinted as much when he reassured fans he hadn't forgotten about Stoney.

Although his country era has been hugely successful, with F-1Trillion marking the genre-blurring maverick's first Billboard 200 No. 1 since Hollywood's Bleeding, there have been widespread reports that his Big Ass Stadium Tour Pt. 2 is selling poorly.

Then came the announcement that he'd be pushing back the first few dates so that he could finish the album. Many fans didn't buy this, particularly after all the rumblings of low ticket sales. As a result, Post might be considering embracing his signature Stoney sound alongside some country in order to welcome back his Day One fans into the fold - and, hopefully, into the stadiums this summer.

We'll have to wait and see what Post puts into his June 9th setlist at the Bank of America Stadium in Charleston, North Carolina before we have a crystal clear idea of what to expect from his 2026 shows. But you can guarantee that, whichever songs Post decides to perform, he'll be backed by a live country band, one of the many signs of his continued - and arguably unmatched - artistic evolution.

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