Austin received generally positive reviews from music critics and debuted at number two on Billboard 200 chart, in which it earned 113,000 album-equivalent units, of which 34,000 units were pure album sales.
Background and promotion
On May 15, 2023, Malone posted a video on Instagram to announce the album, which is titled after his real first name.[3][4] The message hinted at a different artistic approach, possibly intensifying the sound of his fourth studio album, Twelve Carat Toothache (2022).[5] Malone revealed that he played the guitar on every single song on the album, calling the creation process a "fun experience".[6] He described the outcome as the "most challenging and rewarding music" he had ever made, which was a product of constantly making himself work to make it.[7] That same day, Malone also announced a summer North American tour called the If Y'all Weren't Here, I'd Be Crying Tour to accompany the release of the album, which later became a world tour that started on July 8 and ended on December 3, 2023.[8]
Singles
On April 14, 2023, Malone released the lead single of the album, "Chemical".[9] The second single of the album, "Mourning", was released on May 19.[10] The third single, "Overdrive", was released on July 14.[11] The fourth and final single, "Enough Is Enough", was sent to Italian contemporary hit radio, on September 8, 2023.[12]
Austin was met with generally positive reviews. At Metacritic, which assigns a rating out of 100 to reviews from professional publications, the album received a weighted average score of 66, based on 10 reviews, indicating "generally favorable reviews".[14] Aggregator AnyDecentMusic? gave it 5.5 out of 10, based on their assessment of the critical consensus.[13]
Neil Z. Yeung of AllMusic praised the album, stating, "Melodic and heartfelt, Austin surprises at nearly every turn, whether that's by an unexpected sonic detour or the simple fact that Post Malone has never sounded this fearless".[15] Erica Campbell of NME wrote that Malone's "shift from trap beats and hip hop delivery to purer pop suits [him] well, proving that slowing down can be a creative advantage, especially when you're heading in the right direction",[19] while Clash's Robin Murray described Austin as "an album that dares to buck trends, and at its best can be genuinely moving".[17]Variety critic Chris Willman said, "It sounds like sobering stuff on paper. But on record, a lot of these songs play out as breezily as Styles' "As It Was". It's a record that's in constant conflict with itself, using candor and humor as a self-conscious form of denial, maybe; the easygoing infectiousness of the music always is reassuring us that there's nothing to worry about amid all this conspicuous consumption".[24] Reviewing the album for American Songwriter, Thomas Galindo stated, "While his 17 new songs don't amount to a flawless masterpiece, they do paint a picture of a Post Malone who not only knows he needs to turn things around, but also intends to at any cost".[16]
Rolling Stone's Clayton Purdom wrote that "even if Austin is Post's guitar record, it's not his rock record", and found that "plenty of it works" even if "the immense self-loathing with which the record introduces itself finds no clear resolution by the end, despite many allusions on otherwise-peppy songs".[25] Paul Attard of Slant Magazine commented that "little on the album could be regarded as hip-hop-oriented" as its tracks "are primarily structured around stadium-sized pop hooks", which he found "all follow the same overly simplistic pop structure".[22] Writing for Pitchfork, Brad Shoup felt that Austin "is Post at his strongest: audaciously raiding the entire pop toolkit" and "even after forsaking Los Angeles for Utah, his life remains a movie: loaded with state-of-the-industry pyrotechnics, bristling with guns, and littered with synergistic product tie-ins", which makes the album "in directorial terms, a one-for-me situation: a passion project secured with almost a decade at the summit of pop rap as collateral".[21]Riff Magazine wrote that Austin was "influenced by '80s and '90s alternative rock," which tended to "slow down the middle of the album."[1]
Commercial performance
In the United States, Austin debuted at number two on Billboard 200 chart, earning 113,000 album-equivalent units (including 34,000 in pure album sales) in its first week. This became Malone's fifth top-five album on the chart after all his previous studio albums reached the top five. The album also accumulated a total of 101.14 million on-demand streams of the album's songs.[26]
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