Pollstar's Top 20 Club Venues

If you ever wondered what the best clubs to play were, Pollstar has that info for you. Here are the top 20 clubs in the world according to attendance in 2015.

1. 302,211- House Of Blues, Boston Boston, MA

2. 287,085 - Webster Hall, New York, NY

3. 286,530 - Terminal 5, New York, NY

4. 258,323 - 9:30 Club, Washington, DC

5. 215,169 - Ancienne Belgique, Brussels, BELGIUM

6. 190,317 - The Wilbur, Boston, MA

7. 187,330 - The Pageant, St. Louis, MO

8. 183,335 - First Avenue, Minneapolis, MN

9. 162,080 - Brooklyn Bowl, Brooklyn, NY

10. 141,363 - Metropolis, Montreal, CANADA

11. 139,473 - Starland Ballroom, Sayreville, NJ

12. 137,293 - Arvest Bank Theatre At The Midland, Kansas City, MO

13. 136,830 - Ogden Theatre, Denver, CO

14. 136,662 - The Paramount, Huntington, NY

15. 135,850 - Roseland Theater, Portland, OR

16. 133,553 - The Joint @ Hard Rock Hotel / Casino, Las Vegas, NV

17. 130,641 - Cain’s Ballroom, Tulsa, OK

18. 130,262 - McMenamins Crystal Ballroom, Portland, OR

19. 126,477 - Stubb’s Bar-B-Q, Austin, TX

20. 121,140 - Brooklyn Bowl Las Vegas, Las Vegas, NV

Take notice that there are only 2 clubs in the top 20 that are outside the US, and that New York has the most clubs in the area with 5.

It's also interesting that the top clubs are fairly well spread out around the country, with venues in Missouri, Minnesota and Oklahoma being represented.

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The 20 Top Grossing Tours Of 2015

One of the cool things about the music business in 2016 is that it looks like analytics have finally caught up to the business to the point where it doesn't take months to get the big picture. It used to be February or March before we would see yearly sales figures, but now we're seeing them within the first couple of weeks in January.

A good example of this is Pollstar's annual top grossing tours. Here are the 20 tours that made the most money in 2015.

1. $250.4 - Taylor Swift

2. $210.2 - One Direction

3. $180.0 - AC/DC

4. $152.2 - U2

5. $127.0 - Foo Fighters

6. $125.1 - Fleetwood Mac

7. $117.3 - Ed Sheeran

8. $116.4 - Kenny Chesney

9. $114.9 - Garth Brooks

10. $109.7 - The Rolling Stones

11. $88.4 - Madonna

12. $82.2 - Kevin Hart

13. $77.7 - Paul McCartney

14. $77.6 - Elton John

15. $76.8 - Violetta

16. $72.0 - Maroon 5

17. $71.8 Luke Bryan

18. $69.9 - Billy Joel

19. $69.0 - Shania Twain

20. $68.0 - Neil Diamond

A couple of quick notes.

• A bad sign for the business is that over half of the top money-making tours were from legacy artists.
• Comedian Kevin Hart probably personally made more than everyone but Ed Sheeran, as his overhead costs were particularly low.

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Top Concert Draws

Here are the top concert draws as of last week, courtesy of Pollstar. The list indicates this weeks ranking, last week's ranking in parenthesis, total revenue, and average ticket price in the last column.

There are a couple of things to note here. First of all, most of the acts are decidedly "old school," although Taylor Swift, Justin Bieber and Bruno Mars are strong. Secondly, the prices for the country artists are very reasonable, costing between $31 and $40, although Bad Company/Lynyrd Skynyrd and Styx/REO Speedwagon/Ted Nugent are reasonable as well.

1. (1) The Rolling Stones; $7,772,849;                                    $345.49.

2. (New) Paul McCartney; $3,620,049;                                    $131.27.

3. (2) Taylor Swift; $3,021,717;                                                  $86.51.

4. (3) Kenny Chesney; $2,246,701;                                           $75.53.

5. (4) Fleetwood Mac; $1,427,403;                                             $110.90.

6. (New) Phish; $1,391,413;                                                         $48.76.

7. (5) Justin Bieber; $1,267,409;                                                  $80.71.

8. (6) Dave Matthews Band; $1,134,333;                                   $55.10.

9. (8) Bruno Mars; $1,029,608;                                                     $71.36.

10. (9) New Kids On The Block; $830,439;                                $65.06.

11. (New) Blake Shelton; $672,657;                                           $32.24.

12. (10) Tim McGraw; $586,428;                                                  $38.25.

13. (11) Brad Paisley; $569,683;                                                  $36.13.

14. (New) Rascal Flatts; $567,025;                                              $40.02.

15. (12) Carrie Underwood; $527,808;                                        $70.00.

16. (14) Barry Manilow; $377,596;                                                $67.98.

17. (13) Widespread Panic; $376,122;                                         $47.11.

18. (16) Bad Company / Lynyrd Skynyrd; $311,304;                  $31.44.

19. (17) The Postal Service; $249,253;                                         $41.27.

20. (18) Styx / REO Speedwagon / Ted Nugent; $225,939;       $35.27.

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Concert Revenue Isn't What It Used To Be

It used to be that a star or superstar act going out on tour was really going to cash in, but it looks like the good times are over, according to Pollstar magazine, considered by many to be almost the bible when it comes to ticket sales.

How about these for numbers?

  *  The revenue of the 50 biggest grossing tours in the world declined 12% last year from 2009.

  *  It was even worse in North America, as sales were down 15%.

  *  The number of tickets sold declined 7% world-wide and 12% in North America.

  *  Yet ticket prices increased by 4% despite last minute discounting by giant concert promoter Live Nation.

  *  The top 50 acts played 8% fewer shows than the year before.

  * Promoters slashed prices to as low as $10 for the Jonas Brothers, Maroon 5, Stevie Winwood and Santana, Creed, and the American Idol tours, among many others.

So who were the biggest grossing tours?

1) Bon Jovi - $201 million (U2 made $311 mil the year before)

2) AC/DC - $177 mil

3) U2

4) Lady Gaga

5) Metallica

What does this all mean? This was probably a healthy course-correction in the business. As a result, what we'll see next year is more reasonable pricing, fewer tours by acts who were out last year (you can't tour the same places with the same songs every year and expect big sales), and maybe some sanity returning to a business that never had to worry about a recession before.

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You should follow me on Twitter for daily news and updates on production and the music business.

Check out my Big Picture blog for discussion on common music, engineering and production tips and tricks.

Help support this blog. Any purchases made through our Amazon links help support this website with no cost to you.