A giant Beatle "did some damage" during his romp through Japan, and that's not a reference to the nation's classic monster films. Paul McCartney was the highest earner on Billboard's final Hot Tours list of 2013, and much of that was thanks to the six-date stretch he spent in Japan during November.
According to reports from the music industry publication, McCartney's tour in support of new album New brought in around $105.8 million during 2013. Numbers from the last leg of the bassist's tour suggest that $40.6 million of that was made in his six-show stretch in Japan.
It was McCartney's first touring trip to Japan in 11 years, and fans made the most of it. He began with a two-night series in Osaka on November 11-12 at the Kyocera Dome. The venue, also the city's major league baseball stadium, seats 50,000, and both shows sold out, bringing in $11.6 million per gig, a $3.4 million jump since the last time McCartney was in town.
The former Beatle also headed to Tokyo selling out all three nights of his stay at the Tokyo Dome. Nearly 147,000 tickets were sold, totaling $23.4 million in revenue, another jump from his 2002 tour. In between his dates in Osaka and Tokyo, McCartney played one show at the Yafuoka! Dome in Fukuoka, which brought in an additional $6.6 million, if we did the math right.
These numbers basically confirm the '70s notion that big acts play big shows in Japan, and also that big acts make big money in Japan. Bon Jovi was the highest earning tour of 2013, bringing more than $205 million. But that group played more than 100 shows. Using faulty logic, it could be argued that McCartney would have brought in that total with 30 shows in Japan. It may be less than 11 years before McCartney comes back to the country.
