Music winners 2015: Adele, Taylor swift, Kendrick Lamar, Katy perry.
DJ Khaled famously released a song called “All I Do Is Win.” Perhaps it’s time for a Taylor Swift remix: for the second year in a row, she’s...
DJ Khaled famously released a song called “All I Do Is Win.” Perhaps it’s time for a Taylor Swift remix: for the second year in a row, she’s one of our year-end music business winners.
After riding the success of 1989 to all sorts of honors–including the title of top-selling album of 2014, moving over 3.6 million units–Swift has taken her act on the road. Her 1989 World Tour is selling out stadiums worldwide, grossing over $4 million per night. Despite the fact that our highest-paid musicians scoring period only captured the first part of the tour, she captured the No. 4 spot with earnings of $80 million, a total that could double on next year’s list.
“It’s a stadium tour, it’s enormous,” said Pollstar’s Gary Bongiovanni. “I would imagine that she’s going to dwarf what everybody else does.”
Adele seems to be following a similar path. For a variety of reasons, many of them intangible, her album 25 became the fastest-selling album in recorded history. The record moved 3.38 units in its opening week, roughly 1 million more than the previous champion album by *NSYNC 15 years ago, and has gone on to sell over 5 million copies in the U.S. alone in less than a month.
Like Swift, she’s now parlaying recorded music success into an international tour. Adele has 40 show dates planned through May–coupled with her earnings from record sales, she should find herself in the upper reaches of our lists of highest-paid entertainers next year.