From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
|
Post Malone |
|
|
Post Malone performing in May 2015. |
|
|
Background information |
|
|
Birth name |
Austin Richard Post |
|
Born |
July 4, 1995 (age 21) |
|
Origin |
Dallas, Texas, U.S. |
|
Occupation(s) |
|
|
Instruments |
|
|
Years active |
2014–present |
|
Website |
|
Austin Richard Post (born July 4, 1995), known by his stage name Post Malone, is an American singer, guitarist and record producer. He first gained major recognition in February 2015, after the release of his debut commercial single "White Iverson". In August 2015, Malone landed a record deal with Republic.
Contents [hide]
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Post began to play the guitar, while becoming a member of a heavy metal band in his high school. He credited his initial interest in learning guitar to the popular video game Guitar Hero. He began first learning how to produce music through FL Studio. When he was 16 years old, he has started working on his first independent mixtape. He showed it to some of his classmates and it gained him some popularity at his high school.[5] He credited his love for music to his father, who exposes him to be making music for all genres, which includes country music.
Post attended and graduated from Grapevine High School. He then enrolled in Tarrant County College, but he only attended there for a few months.[1]
After leaving college, Malone moved from Dallas, Texas to Los Angeles, California, with his longtime friend, named Jason Stokes. He later participated in a music group, called BLKCVRD (with Jason Stokes and Billie Gvtes).[citation needed] He met 1st and Rich from FKi Music, who did some of the production work on several of Malone's tracks, one of which was titled "White Iverson".[1] Malone recorded the song two days, after he wrote it.[5] "White Iverson" is what he made it out to became a topic to the song, with his hair all braided, as part of the reference to the professional basketball player Allen Iverson.[4][6][7] In February 2015, upon the completion, it was uploaded to Post's SoundCloud account.[8] On July 19, 2015, Malone released a music video for "White Iverson", which received over 163 million views since its initial release. After the initial hype of "White Iverson", Post released some several other popular singles through his SoundCloud, including "Too Young", "What's Up" and "Tear$". All of which saw a similar level of popularity to the breakout hit. These songs quickly gained him attention from record labels, after plays of over a million in one month each time that it upload.[6] In August 2015, he secured the idea to signed a recording contract with Republic Records.[9][10]
Since his breakthrough hit song, Malone began working with a number of prominent rappers such as 50 Cent, Young Thug and Kanye West, among others.[11][12]Malone began his friendship with a Canadian singer-songwriter Justin Bieber, which led to Malone to be a opening act for Bieber's Purpose World Tour.[13] On April 20, 2016, Malone premiered his new single, called "Go Flex" on Zane Lowe's Beats 1 show.[14] On May 12, 2016, he released his first full-length project, a mixtape, titled August 26th.[15] On June 9, 2016, Malone made his national television debut on Jimmy Kimmel Live!, performing "Go Flex".[16] In June 2016, XXL editor-in chief Vanessa Satten, revealed Post Malone was considered for XXL's "2016 Freshmen Class" magazine cover, however she was "told by his camp that he wasn't paying attention to hip hop so much. He was going in more of a rock/pop/country direction."[17] However, Malone denied these claims a couple days later, saying: "My love of music should never be questioned... I shouldn't be chastised in whichever way I see fit." He then went on to explain that his latest mixtape as well as his upcoming album are both hip-hop: "I have a hip-hop album coming out in August... I made a HIP HOP mixtape promoting my HIP HOP album."[18]
Although it is suggested that Post's stage name is a reference to the professional basketball player, Karl Malone,[7] he has said otherwise. In an interview with The Breakfast Club, he explains "Well Post is my last name, and I just made Malone up."[4]