Here’s Proof Australia Loves Blockbuster International Tours

December 18, 2014

Australian tours, venues, promoters and festivals have all ranked highly in Billboard‘s year end Boxscore report with local names like Frontier Touring, Chugg Entertainment and Byron Bay’s Bluesfest named amongst the world’s highest grossing live music industry figures in 2014.

According to the Boxscore results, beloved Australian festival Byron Bay Bluesfest is amongst the world’s top ten festivals. The 2014 iteration of the festival, its 25th anniversary edition, grossed over AU$14 million. It still has some catching up to do however, as the year’s most successful festival was California’s Coachella, which grossed over US$78 million and which, no doubt, hosted many an Australian attendee.

The Rolling Stones performed for nearly 781,000 people in the last year and raked in more than $143 million with their 14 On Fire world tour, ranking them at number three behind One Direction and Justin Timberlake on the Billboard Boxscore list of the top 25 tours of 2014.

Of special mention are the band’s Perth stops, where the veteran rockers managed to gross over US$9 million (AU$11 million) in just two shows.

Australian promoters Danity Group, Frontier Touring and Chugg Entertainment, responsible for some of the year’s biggest tours, are each amongst the publication’s top 25 promoters worldwide. Danity ranked 5th, grossing almost $137 million this year from 152 shows attended by 1,186,055 punters.

Frontier was ranked 8th with their near $118 million in earnings from 85 shows and Chugg was placed 13th, their 184 shows grossing over $54 million in 2014. Some of those shows were hosted at Melbourne’s Etihad stadium, which was ranked the third most successful stadium globally.

The venue brought in over $29 million from its six shows, attended by 231,874 fans, in the last year. That number is sure to increase as the venue hosts One Direction and Foo Fighters concerts in the new year.

Other Australian venues including Sydney’s Allphones Arena and Qantas Credit Union Arena, Melbourne’s Rod Laver Arena and The Brisbane Entertainment Centre are also recognised.

One Direction and Justin Timberlake dominated the box office in 2014. Their global tours combined grossed close to $500 million and sold more than 5 million tickets.

Head to Billboard for all the data.