Rolling Stones Most Successful Live Act of the Decade

Posted on Dec 18th 2009 5:56AM by Matt Glazebrook
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When people in the 1960s pictured to the brave new world of the early 21st Century, what did they imagine? Flying cars? Colonies on Mars? Entire meals in pill form? One thing they probably didn't expect was that we'd all be rocking out to the crazy futuristic sounds of a little group called the Rolling Stones.

Yes, Mick, Keef, Ronnie and Charlie are officially the most popular band of the noughties, at least if you go by gig ticket sales. The hard-rocking 60-somethings have raked in an astonishing £539 million from concertgoers since the start of 2000, after putting 8,236,586 bums on seats at 264 shows. The Stones beat out U2 for the top tourer crown -- according to a chart compiled by Billboard -- after the Irish rockers could only prise a paltry £523 million from 9,869,953 fans at their 288 shows. Small comfort for Bono and co, but they can at least boast a 100% sell-out record for the decade, compared to the Rolling Stones' 190 full houses.

The noughties' other hottest tickets included Madonna, Bruce Springsteen, Elton John, Celine Dion, Dave Matthews Band, Kenny Chesney, Bon Jovi and Billy Joel. Matthews' jam band extravaganza attracted the largest (if not the most high rolling) audience: 11,230,696 tickets sold in total.

So no one you'd actually think of as a '00s artist in the top ten, then. But fear not, Coldplay, White Stripes, Kanye et al, if everything goes to plan -- and provided Mick Jagger's not still shuffling and pouting around the stage by then -- you can look forward to a very lucrative 2040s.