Listen future pop stars: Usher’s technique for harnessing the Tremendous Bowl’s large viewers into sellout headliner live shows is a grasp class in how one can parlay a profession milestone right into a legacy solidifying tour.
The R&B icon has been capable of seize the pre-game buzz round his efficiency on the Apple Music Tremendous Bowl LVIII Halftime present with a fastidiously coordinated presale marketing campaign for his fall Previous Current Future tour. As soon as hardcore followers grabbed their tickets (most went on sale Feb. 9), Usher’s crew began increasing the dates primarily based on demand to verify there’ll nonetheless be loads of tickets accessible for most people on the Monday (Feb. 12) after the sport.
Thus far, there have been 360,000 tickets bought in presale for the Previous Current Future tour, in response to Dwell Nation World Touring chairman Arthur Fogel, and dates have expended from 24 to 44 throughout the U.S. because the preliminary presale launched on Thursday (Feb 8). Billboard estimates that when the remaining tickets will go on sale Monday after the Tremendous Bowl, the Previous Current Future tour with be Usher’s highest grossing tour ever.
“The success of tour started a number of years in the past when Usher launched his residency in Vegas, which re-established his greatness,” Fogel says. “Now he’s constructing off that success together with his present tour and the presales show there’s unprecedented demand to see him carry out dwell.”
Ever since Usher was introduced because the Apple Music Tremendous Bowl LVIII Halftime Present headliner, his touring crew — supervisor Ron Lafitte, agent and WME companion John Marx and Dwell Nation promoters Colin Lewis and Fogel — have been constructing an area touring technique that absolutely capitalizes on the large recreation’s enormous viewers. Final yr’s win by the Kansas Metropolis Chiefs over the Philadelphia Eagles in Glendale, Ariz., was watched by greater than 115 million viewers within the U.S., making it not solely essentially the most watched Tremendous Bowl in historical past, but in addition the most well-liked TV program of all time in America.
Regardless of the large viewership, the final 5 artists to play the Tremendous Bowl halftime present haven’t introduced headlining excursions after their efficiency. And those that did, like Justin Timberlake in 2018 and Beyonce in 2017, didn’t have any tickets on sale so shortly after the occasion.
Usher wasn’t going to let the momentum go to waste, although. Days after his Tremendous Bowl Halftime efficiency was locked in, Marx started plotting out an area tour. His cost from Usher was to attempt to replicate the intimacy of his Las Vegas residency reveals, first in 2021 on the Colosseum at Caesars Palace after which on the 2022-2023 My Method Las Vegas residency at Dolby Dwell at Park MGM.
“He wished to play extra multi-night runs in greater cities,” Marx advised Billboard, noting that Usher loved the thrill multi-night engagements generated.
In complete, Usher is enjoying 44 reveals in 17 markets (places for 3 of dates haven’t but been introduced). The Previous Current Future tour will formally launch in Washington, D.C. (Aug. 20) and features a four-night cease at Brooklyn’s Barclay Heart (Sept. 6-10), 4 nights on the yet-to-be-opened Inuit Dome in Inglewood, Calif. (Sept. 17-24), three nights in Miami on the Kaseya Heart (Oct. 11-14), three nights at State Farm Area in Atlanta (Oct. 17-20), and three nights on the United Heart in Chicago (Oct 28-31).
“Gross sales are past anybody’s wildest goals proper now,” Marx says, noting that much more U.S. dates may very well be added and {that a} U.Okay. and European tour will likely be introduced sooner or later. “Fairly actually, we’re simply getting began,” he provides. “Every part I’ve seen and heard has made it clear to me that individuals in every single place actually wish to be at these reveals.”
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