Touring
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Killswitch Engage‘s tour bus collided with an elk as the rock band was driving to an appearance at In Flames’ Dalhalla Brinner festival in Rättvik, Sweden, on Friday (Aug. 25). Frontman Jesse Leach took to Instagram shortly after the terrifying experience to share a video of the large vehicle’s shattered windshield and pen a deep […]
The Latin music world has been abuzz about the reunion of Mexican pop band RBD, who played their last show as a group in December 2008 in Madrid. Since that day, fans have been clamoring for a reunion, but the likelihood of that happening had seemed far. Now, five of the original six members — […]
Liam Payne has been hospitalized and is postponing his tour, the former One Direction member announced on his social media accounts on Friday (Aug. 25). “It’s with a heavy heart I have to tell you that we have no other choice but to postpone my upcoming tour of South America,” the singer wrote. “Over the […]
Late last year, Ben Gibbard was staring down a pair of significant milestones: Death Cab for Cutie’s breakthrough album, Transatlanticism, would be turning 20 in 2023, as would Give Up, the lone full-length that Gibbard and electronic artist Jimmy Tamborello released as The Postal Service. Death Cab’s management suggested separate 20th-anniversary tours, but Gibbard envisioned a two-for-one nostalgia jamboree.
“I was like, ‘People are going to lose their minds if this is one tour,’ ” he recalls. “And I think the initial response and ticket counts were certainly a vindication of my approach.”
Indeed, the Give Up/Transatlanticism joint tour will bring both indie touchstones to arena and theater crowds beginning Sept. 5, with stops at New York’s Madison Square Garden and two hometown gigs at Seattle’s Climate Pledge Arena among 31 scheduled dates (up from 17 when the tour was announced in December). Gibbard will naturally pull double duty — performing Transatlanticism front-to-back with Death Cab and all of Give Up with Tamborello and Jenny Lewis, who provided backing vocals on six album tracks.
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For Gibbard, the tour will revisit the most pivotal year of his career. Death Cab, which formed in 1997, famously came close to breaking up in late 2001 after touring and recording at a breakneck pace. The subsequent downtime gave a then-25-year-old Gibbard the space to craft the foundation of Transatlanticism, as well as work with Tamborello on an indie-pop side project by mailing CD-Rs to each other (hence the name The Postal Service).
“All of a sudden, I found myself with a lot of time to meander creatively,” recalls Gibbard, now 47. “I felt very confident, and maybe a little bit cocky. I could musically wander and explore the space, and it was very fruitful for me.”
Give Up turned into a blog-adored cult classic, while Transatlanticism took Death Cab “from indie-rock popular” to “popular popular,” as Gibbard puts it. Although Give Up peaked at No. 45 on the Billboard 200 and Transatlanticism at No. 97, they’ve earned 1.8 million and 1.1 million equivalent album units, respectively, according to Luminate.
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Looking back, Gibbard is grateful that his breakthrough with both albums occurred a half-decade into his career. “We had [already] gone through some very difficult times together, and come out the other end,” he explains. “I can’t say with any certainty that if things were like they are now — a band puts out a three-song EP and is selling out shows and has people putting cameras in their faces — there’s no way we would have survived that.”
While Death Cab was just on the road in support of its 10th album, 2022’s Asphalt Meadows, the upcoming tour will mark The Postal Service’s first concerts in a decade, since Give Up turned 10. For Gibbard, these Postal Service shows will be slightly different — unlike in 2013, Give Up will be played in order, without B-sides or covers — but performing again with Tamborello and Lewis will be just as fulfilling.
“These are two of my best friends, that I get to spend extended time with on this trip,” says Gibbard. “We get to celebrate this record that we made, that became this kind of lauded moment in indie rock — but also, it’s a celebration of our friendship.”
A version of this story will appear in the Aug. 26, 2023, issue of Billboard.
You wanna go for a ride back to the ’90s? AQUA is here to deliver. The Danish dance-pop group announced its Barbie World Tour on Friday (Aug. 25) with dates across the United States in an appropriately pink photo. The trek kicks off in Seattle at the historic Paramount Theatre on Nov. 12, and wraps […]
German concert promoter CTS Eventim says successful tours by Herbert Grönemeyer, Hans Zimmer and P!nk led an “encouraging” first half of 2023 and provide “a cause for optimism” in the second half of the year. Six-month revenue increased 39% to 1.02 billion euros ($1.1 billion at the average exchange rate in the period), marking the first time CTS exceeded 1 billion euros for any six-month period, the company announced Thursday (Aug. 24). Earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) also rose 39% to 170.8 million euros ($185 million).
Looking ahead, CTS Eventim’s leadership expects both full-year revenue and EBITDA to increase compared to 2022. Pre-sales for Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour were the company’s “absolute top seller for the current year” and will hit the company’s third-quarter financial statements, according to the earnings press release. Additionally, CTS Eventim’s acquisition of a majority stake in French ticketing company France Billet will not be reflected in the financials until the acquisition is completed.
The company has fully recovered from “market distortions caused by pandemic-related catch-up effects” and is experiencing “healthy organic growth” augmented by developing and expanding business segments, CEO Klaus-Peter Schulenberg said in a statement. “The breadth and depth of our portfolio and the successful internationalization of our business are the key drivers of our strong and stable growth,” he added.
CTS Eventim’s live entertainment segment posted revenue of 751 million euros ($812 million), up 39% from the prior-year period, and EBITDA of 48.5 million euros ($52 million), a 21% increase. About 50 million euros ($54 million) of that revenue came from the United States, where CTS Eventim launched a partnership with promoter Michael Cohl in 2020.
Ticketing revenue increased 41% to 284.6 million euros ($308 million) and normalized EBITDA improved 48% to 122.3 million euros ($132 million) due to “a broad range and large number of successful events and tours,” primarily in Germany, Italy and Austria. The company sold 34.3 million web tickets in the first half of the year, 6.4 million more than the prior-year period.
Shares of CTS Eventim dropped 1.1% to 58.35 euros ($63.07) on Thursday. Year-to-date, the stock is down 2.1%, which the company attributes to “the change in risk perception among institutional investors” as “global equity markets trended sideways in the first half of 2023.” CTS Eventim’s shares have had their own trajectory in recent months, however, losing 18% of their value since the company’s allegedly anticompetitive behaviors attracted criticism from German television host Jan Böhmermann in June.
For nearly four decades, Billboard Boxscore has tracked the top tours, and touring artists, in the music industry, across various musical genres. The 2023 Billboard Boxscore Mid-Year report, which was led by pop star Harry Styles, whose Love on Tour trek grossed $138.6 million and sold 1.2 million tickets across 38 shows between Nov. 1, […]
Beyoncé crowned May’s Top Tours chart before sliding back to No. 2 in June. Back with a vengeance, she’s at No. 1 for July with record-breaking revenue. According to figures reported to Billboard Boxscore, The Renaissance World Tour earned $127.6 million over 11 shows between July 8-30, claiming the largest one-month sum for any artist since the Boxscore archives began in the mid-1980s.
It’s not Beyoncé’s first time setting Boxscore records with the Renaissance World Tour. When her five-show run at London’s Tottenham Hotspur Stadium grossed $42.2 million, it was noted that it was the highest grossing engagement ever by a woman, a Black artist, or any American artist.
This time around, her enormous earnings require no such qualifications, breaking ground without regard to race, gender, genre or geography. Beyoncé’s $127.6 million passes Bad Bunny’s $123.6 million from last September, claiming the biggest one-month gross since the charts launched in February 2019 – and beyond. Before the monthly charts premiered, no artist had reported earnings of $100 million in a single calendar month.
Beyoncé and Bad Bunny, as well as other stadium headliners such as Harry Styles and The Weeknd, continue to show how contemporary acts have invaded a space once thought to be reserved for classic rock bands. Notably, Taylor Swift has yet to report sales figures for The Eras Tour. The last time she was on the road, she joined Beyoncé with Jay-Z, and Ed Sheeran at the top of the pack of 2018’s year-end rankings.
Beyoncé and Bad Bunny’s $120 million-plus months played out in strikingly similar fashion. Both played five one-night engagements, plus doubleheaders in three cities for a total of 11 shows. Both narrowly sold more than half a million tickets – 503,000 for Beyoncé and 501,000 for Bad Bunny. And both relied on a couple major markets to push them over the edge (and then some). Bad Bunny benefited from shows in Inglewood (the greater Los Angeles area) and Las Vegas, while Beyoncé played high-yield concerts in East Rutherford, N.J. (the greater New York area), and Chicago.
Beyoncé’s two nights at New Jersey’s MetLife Stadium (July 29-30) brought in $33.1 million and sold 106,000 tickets, enough to reign over Top Boxscores. That makes her the first woman to simultaneously top both lists in exactly four years, dating back to when P!nk led in July 2019.
Queen Bey follows with two dates at Chicago’s Soldier Field, at No. 3 on Top Boxscores with a gross of $30.1 million. Next, she’s at No. 7 with two shows at Toronto’s Roger’s Centre ($18.3 million). There are four more Beyoncé appearances on the chart (Nos. 20, 24, 27, and 30), more than anyone else.
With two months of shows left to report, the Renaissance World Tour is flying at breakneck speed. After conquering Europe with a $150-million run, Beyoncé has made almost as much ($141.4 million) in North America with far fewer shows. Her 12 North American dates (including an Aug. 1 concert in Foxborough, Mass.) have averaged $11.8 million, which is more than double the business that Beyoncé was doing in the U.S. and Canada on 2016’s The Formation World Tour and 2018’s On the Run II Tour with Jay-Z.
Up 60% from the European leg and 112% from her previous peak, Beyoncé’s July Renaissance shows establish a new standard for herself as an artist, and with its monthly record, for everyone on tour.
Through Aug. 1, The Renaissance World Tour has grossed $295.8 million, already Beyoncé’s highest grossing tour yet, passing The Formation World Tour’s $256.1 million. With two months of shows yet to be reported, Billboard expects that total to soar past the half-billion mark.
Beyoncé’s two shows in Chicago pair with an Ed Sheeran date (July 29) to make Soldier Field the top-grossing venue of the month, at No. 1 on Top Stadiums. That chart mirrors the top of Top Boxscores, with Beyoncé and Coldplay fueling the top four spots.
And while Sheeran’s contribution pushes MetLife Stadium to No. 2, the New York market dominates the arena rankings, with Manhattan’s Madison Square Garden and Brooklyn’s Barclays Center at Nos. 1-2 on Top Venues, 15,001+ capacity.
Among venues with a capacity of 5,001-10,000, Red Rocks Amphitheatre earned $16.5 million. Located in Morrison, Colo. (15 miles west of Denver), The Avett Brothers spotlight the iconic amphitheater’s month with three shows, July 7-9, that grossed $2.3 million and sold 28,050 tickets. Tedeschi Trucks Band, Caamp, Zeds Dead and String Cheese Incident each played multiple shows with million-dollar earnings.
The Weeknd follows Beyoncé on Top Tours with a $85.7 million gross, while mounting the highest attendance total of July with 891,000 tickets sold across 15 stadium shows in Europe. Since the monthly charts began in 2019, that total only trails Harry Styles’ 967,000 tickets in June.
Both acts — and Ed Sheeran in third with 749,000 tickets (June 2022) — nabbed their sales highs with extensive runs of European stadium shows, averaging 60,000 or more seats per night. With slightly smaller venues and higher ticket prices, Beyoncé and Bad Bunny’s massive grosses stem from North American legs.
In total, July’s top 30 tours grossed a combined $861.5 million and sold 7.3 million tickets, up .4% and 2%, respectively, from last month’s record-setting figures. While July sported fewer tours with reports above the $10 million and $20 million thresholds, Beyoncé’s monster earnings helped push the total take into uncharted territory.
British superstar Paul McCartney announced on Wednesday (Aug. 23) his return to Mexico City, where he will offer a concert on Nov. 14 at the Foro Sol as part of his international Got Back Tour. It will be his first performance in six years in the Mexican capital. Explore Explore See latest videos, charts and […]
If you haven’t yet stepped into Beyoncé’s House of Chrome, your time is now. On Wednesday (Aug. 23), Queen Bey took to her Instagram Stories and website to make a very special request to her fans and future Renaissance World Tour attendees. “Virgo Season is upon us. This tour has been such a joy and […]