A record year for cancelled tours

The FT reports that the best-laid rock tours are now crashing out.

Ringo Starr is the latest, infected with Covid.

Here’s the FT’s take:
…. Live Nation, the live music juggernaut, in August said it had sold more than 100mn concert tickets this year — more than all of 2019. After a few years of quiet, many acts have rushed back to the stage, and fans are happily showing up to see them.

But there are also some loud signals that in this late stage of the pandemic, the business of concerts is still very much in flux.

Some of the most ambitious tours, such as that of Shawn Mendes and Justin Bieber, have been cancelled — shredding several months of meticulous planning and hundreds of millions of dollars in forfeited ticket sales.

Read on here.