Post Malone Is Planet Earth’s Most Relatable Pop Star

On the night of Thursday, March 12, just hours after some of the world’s largest concert promoters urged a moratorium on live events due to the spreading coronavirus, 18,000 people packed into the Pepsi Center in downtown Denver to watch Post Malone perform. “If I get the coronavirus at the Post Malone concert tonight in Denver just know it was lit,” one fan wrote on Twitter, along with an emoji expressing tears of joy.

Such blind devotion is not uncommon among admirers of Post Malone, a 24-year-old Texan whose real name is Austin Richard Post. Last year, his music was listened to more times than any artist in the U.S., according to MRC Data, and he generated more than 1.6 billion views on YouTube in the U.S., second only to Louisiana rapper YoungBoy Never Broke Again.