By Lauren Wilson for Music Dealers.
The music industry just can’t get a break.
It seems nothing, not even the once unstoppable “American Idols Live” tour, can overcome the slump in summer concert sales. The return of Lilith Fair after an 11 year absence was marred by the cancellation of 13 dates and relocation to smaller venues. Many other artists including the Jonas Brothers, Rihanna, and Christina Aguilera have similarly been forced to cancel dates or in Aguilera’s case, push 20 US shows to 2011. On top of it all, Bono’s emergency back surgery in May caused U2 to cancel its entire North American tour this summer which certainly didn’t help matters considering, the Irish super group was the top-selling act in 2009, grossing $123 million.
In an article for Variety, Terry McBride, CEO of Nettwerk Music Group which helps put on Lilith Fair, cites the economy as the reason for the dip in ticket sales. “The only thing that is up is unemployment,” said McBride. “Concerts are discretionary spending.”
Perhaps it’s time for touring musicians to consider lowering their oftentimes exorbitant ticket prices. While it may have been acceptable to set ticket prices in the hundreds before, it’s no secret that in these days, concertgoers’ wallets are a little thinner than they used to be. An online poll at billboard.biz asked if retailers’ CD price cuts were too little too late. 83% voted yes, that “these measures should have been adopted years ago.” The concert industry should take note and make changes before they too suffer a similar response.
Speaking of album sales, billboard.biz reports there is a small silver lining. Although album sales are far from as high as they used to be, the few (very few – five this year compared to 17 in 2005) records to sell over 1 million units have the largest portion of total sales since 2006. That’s not saying much for the rest of the industry but it’s better than nothing.
For the full story and all the stats on album sales click here.
For the Variety’s story on concert sales click here.
Comments
Comments
Dating myself but I saw U2 in 1985 at the Omni in Atlanta on their Pride tour for $20. I saw REM at a keg party in '82 for $2. These days nosebleeds can go for $100 or more. At a time when that's a phone bill that could be paid it's ridiculous to be expecting people to pay that much.
At least U2 has talked about cutting their ticket prices.