(antiMusic) Today's music business 101 lesson is that overblown hype does not sell inflated concert tickets. Case in point is Motley Crue's stab at a packaged summer tour, which was hyped as "colossal" and "one of the biggest music announcements of the year." According to Blabbermouth, Billboard has revealed the attendance records for a number of stops for this summer's Cruefest; the fest the package tour featuring Motley Crue, Buckcherry, Papa Roach, Trapt and Sixx: AM. Save for Detroit Rock City, almost all of the of the venues were only half-filled when this tour rolled through the various towns. The July 15th stop at the 15,601 capacity DTE Energy Music Center in Clarkston, MI was the only sellout reported. The Houston, TX show at 11,666 capacity Toyota Center came close to selling out as well with a reported 10,347 in attendance, but the bigger venues on the tour didn't produce the results the hype led us to expect. In fact, the tour played to half capacity venues for most of the tour.
In Dallas they sold 12,155 tickets out of a possible 20,033. In Selma they sold 9,252 tickets out of a possible 19,921. In Maryland Heights, MO they sold 10,908 tickets out of a possible 20,950. In Noblesville, IN they sold 15,012 tickets out of a possible 24,680. In Bristow, VA they sold 11,527 tickets out of a possible 23,287. In Camden, NJ they sold 11,102 tickets out of a possible 25,326. In Wantagh, NY they sold 8,990 tickets out of a possible 13,827. In Virginia Beach, VA they sold 10,238 tickets out of a possible 20,015. In Charlotte, NC they sold 12,544 tickets out of a possible 18,808. In Tampa, FL they sold 10,020 tickets out of a possible 17,459, and in West Palm Beach, FL they sold 8,700 tickets out of a possible 19,438.
Of course, anyone outside of their fan club and management company saw through the hype and could have predicted that this tour would have done relatively well, but would be far from the biggest tour of the summer. Had they had more realistic ticket prices it could have done much better in ticket sales. [A sampling of just the Charlotte shows and Linkin Park's Projekt Revolution tickets range from $44.75 to $60.75 for reserved seating and $20.75 for lawn seats, while Crue Fest charged $45.50 to $95.00 for reserved seating and $29.50 for lawn seats.]
Some might point to a sagging economy as a reason this tour didn't sell that well, but last week Billboard reported that attendance is actually up at amphitheatres this summer. read that report.
While the high ticket prices for the Crue Fest probably was the main factor that hurt attendance, it didn't hurt the grosses with all of the stops bringing in over 300K and some bringing in much more than that. Hopefully if they plan to do this next year they will bring ticket prices down to a more reasonable level so more fans can afford to attend. You can read all the details about each stop including grosses etc at Blabbermouth
