ACM Artist of the Decade, Jason Aldean, is set to return to Australia in 2026 after a ten-year hiatus, extending his Full Throttle World Tour to add six shows in Australia, which include headlining an inaugural country music festival, Sunburnt Country. 

With many Australian music festivals on shaky ground, Aldean’s impressive country influence (evident from nearly 20 billion streams) makes him the ideal choice to have at the helm, and a confident punt for festival organisers. The significance of headlining a brand new Australian festival was not lost on Aldean when he spoke to Countrytown, grateful for the opportunity and keen to head down under, where he reminisces on fond memories and wild crowds some ten years ago.

“I remember the fans being incredible, and it blew my mind. I had never been to Australia, so to go there and play our shows and people know the music and be as intense as they were for our show. I thought it was amazing”, said Aldean.

Aldean’s international run is set to kick off in February in Auckland, with New Zealand being a first for the seasoned artist, before playing in Brisbane, Melbourne and Sydney. In amongst these tour dates, Aldean will perform at the Sunburnt Country festival in Toowoomba, the Hunter Valley and Canberra.

On Aldean’s first tour to Australia in 2016, he became the first headliner to ever sell out CMC Rocks QLD Country Music. Since then, Aldean has another five studio albums under his belt, and another album he said will be released around the same time as the tour. With the Georgia-born artist backed by twenty years of work and 30 No. 1 hits on his hands, his Australian shows will be a bumper-to-bumper set for fans new and old.

Aldean said, “Having enough hits to put it in your show to fill it up… that takes a lot of guesswork out of it. At this point, we kind of know the songs that we want to go out and play.”

“I've been doing this long enough now that I know which songs are you going to go out, which ones are going to land. When to take it down a notch, when to take it back up a notch. You kind of figure all those things out the more you're on the road,” Aldean said.

Describing his group as a “rock and roll band with a country music singer”, Aldean brings a gritty edge to his craft, which makes his live shows stand out. 

“It's a little different. I always tell people, it's not your granddaddy's country music. We're going to go in, it's going to be pretty aggressive. It's loud, it's fun. We obviously know people want to come to shows to have a good time, let their hair down a little bit,” said Aldean.

After recording his twelfth album for the last eight months in a recording studio, Aldean is hankering to hit the road and spend more time in Australia. Aldean’s 2016 jaunt in Australia was a short trip, he admits, and this time plans to return with his young family in tow to make a holiday out of the long-haul journey.

“When we're done with the album, I can kind of take a breath for a minute and go, okay, the new album’s in the can. Now we can go focus on the tour,” Aldean said.

He continued, “It’s really cool, it’s exciting. I'm ready to get it out there, let people check it out, and hopefully have a couple more hits by the time we see you guys.”

Homegrown talent Brad Cox, Dear Tommie and Y.O.G.A will join Aldean on the ticket, as well as friend and fellow US artist Corey Kent. Aldean said that when the Australian festival leg of the Full Throttle tour began to take shape, Corey Kent was a name that was top of the list. Having toured together in recent years, the two have become good friends.

“[I’m] so excited to be taking Corey down there with us. I think for anybody who hasn't gotten turned on to his music yet, he's incredible, he's great. And I think he's gonna kill it down there,” said Aldean.

Kent is a natural choice for a new festival as he is generating a strong current of grassroots fans and has been a popular support act for big names, currently on tour with Morgan Wallen.

With Australian country music scoring another festival at a time when stalwart festivals are starting to close shop, Aldean spoke to Countrytown about the country music genre and the period of growth felt globally.

“Anytime you have a wave of new artists that come in, that's going to kind of bring a lot of excitement to the genre. And that's kind of what happened when we hit the scene. It was me and Luke [Bryan] and Carrie Underwood and Miranda Lambert - we all kind of hit the scene at the same time,” said Aldean.

“So all of a sudden, you got all these young artists that create this buzz, and I think that's kind of what you're seeing now. I think guys like Morgan Wallen and Luke Combs sort of helped to sort of relight that fire a little bit and and then you kind of see everybody else coming in,” he said.

Aldean manages to traverse the line between classic and new wave country with ease, consistently producing music soaked in those familiar country flavours but with something unseen in our artists. 

Tickets to the Full Throttle World Tour in Brisbane, Melbourne and Sydney as well as Sunburnt Country are now on sale to the public.

Sunburnt Country

Toowoomba, QLD - February 21, 2026

Hunter Valley, NSW - February 28, 2026

Canberra, ACT - March 1, 2026

Full Throttle World Tour

Brisbane, QLD - February 22, 2026

Melbourne, VIC - February 25, 2026

Sydney, NSW - February 26, 2026