Artists CANCEL Tours Over AWFUL Ticket Sales

Added: 2026-05-09

[00:00:00]People are worried right now that live music is dying and it certainly looks that way if you see the list of prominent musicians who have had to cancel tours this year because of low ticket sales. And they are coming up with a ton of excuses to distract from that fact, but the truth remains almost nobody can sell out a stadium, even an arena at this point. And the first example, the most recent one is the Pussycat Dolls who announced a reunion tour that was going to go to North America and Europe. They had to cancel their entire North American leg of the tour and seemingly without saying it explicitly admitted it was because they just couldn't sell out these venues.

[00:00:51]And this was their announcement on Instagram.

[00:00:54]Dolls, we want to share an important update with you. When we announced the PCD Forever Tour, we hoped to bring the show to fans across the world. After taking an honest look at the North American run, we have made the difficult and heartbreaking decision to cancel all but one of the North America dates. And the only one that they did not cancel actually wasn't on the official run of the tour itself. It was a festival appearance for pride because I mean, we all know that gay men love the for the Pussycat Dolls like that's that's a given.

[00:01:26]>> before we get into that, before we get into this, you should give everybody the update. What It was one of the other members wasn't able to get back in because of like issues with Nicole Scherzinger. Am I right Am I remembering that correctly? Some of some of the fans were saying the reason behind the low ticket sales was related to the fact that three prior members of the group were not involved in the reunion tour.

[00:01:52]One of them, Jessica, claimed it was because of her support for Trump, which does not make any sense because Nicole Scherzinger herself is a Republican who voted for Trump. So, really it probably came down to a personal dispute. We're never going to know.

[00:02:11]I don't think that's the reason why they couldn't sell out these venues though.

[00:02:15]>> No, it's the Pussycat Dolls.

[00:02:17]>> a a waning interest, sadly, in live entertainment in general and this is hitting people across the board. There were other examples listed in this article as well as the Pussycat Dolls.

[00:02:30]Meghan Trainor recently had to cancel her tour and came up with the excuse that it was because she wanted to spend time with her family. This was her announcement. After a lot of reflection and some really tough conversations, I've made the difficult decision to cancel the Get In Girl Tour. Balancing the release of the new album, preparing for a nationwide tour, and welcoming our new baby girl to our growing family of five has just been more than I can take on right now, and I need to be home and present for each and all of them at this time. I know this will come as a disappointment to my fans and I'm sorry to let you down, but I know this is the right decision for my family and me right now. I promise I'll be back soon and I can't wait for you to hear this new record. I'm proud of it and endlessly grateful for your love and support, always.

[00:03:16]So, this was one that confused people.

[00:03:20]Um I'll mention, by the way, that this new baby they've welcomed into their family was from a surrogate mother. Just going to mention that in case anyone was >> one off the off the description cuz when people hear that they welcomed a baby, they think that she needs to get back into shape, that there was a physical toll taken on her. Interesting though, you can hire someone to gestate your child, but not raise it. Anyways, I think people underestimate Meghan Trainor's commercial success because she's so cringey.

[00:03:54]>> [laughter] >> She's like one of these artists that actually can sell a surprising amount of tickets on a tour like this.

[00:04:02]Like Pink for instance. Yeah. Pink is like someone you think like doesn't have fans, but for some reason she can still sell out arenas.

[00:04:12]Um I mean a newer example is Olivia Rodrigo. She can do stadiums. And she has a huge following of mostly younger fans.

[00:04:24]Um I guess that their parents are just rich.

[00:04:27]A lot of people are priced out of going to concerts these days.

[00:04:32]It's partly because of scalpers, but honestly one of the main problems is because they're being overcharged and on first sale. Yeah. Um it's not just because of resellers jacking up the prices. The The prices are too high to begin with. These artists are probably getting an ego check when they go on They book venues that are way too big.

[00:04:55]And they'd probably be more suited to theaters instead of arenas. Mhm. So Trainor said it was her family duties.

[00:05:03]Zayn, also formerly of One Direction, had to cancel a tour in North America, but kept his dates in the UK where he would sell out more easily because he's British. I mean, that's that's kind of a given, but he alluded to unspecified health concerns.

[00:05:24]And then Post Malone as well was going on a stadium tour with Jelly Roll opening for him. And he canceled the first I think three and a half weeks of it.

[00:05:36]>> Yeah. Because he said he was too busy working on an upcoming album and had to push back the beginning of the tour for that reason. Even though he's He's maintained a handful of festival tour uh tour dates in the same time period.

[00:05:50]Yeah, 20 here from Pop Culture Junkie says, "To make the live concert situation worse, AMC Theaters is launching a new live concert business in partnership with Arena One to stream live interactive performances across hundreds of US cinemas beginning in June 2026."

[00:06:07]That's so like divorced from the experience of >> Yeah.

[00:06:11]going to a concert. That's so soulless.

[00:06:13]>> It feels like the last gasp of these theater companies that are looking for any way to branch out because just movie theaters is not enough anymore.

[00:06:23]It has to be an arcade and a bar and a speak easy and a bowling alley and a bowling alley and a prostitution ring.

[00:06:32]It's >> No, not a strip club, but they it's going to get to that point.

[00:06:35]>> Yeah. At some at I I think that's that's on on the trajectory. They mention here sales for all of the aforementioned artists were notably weak judging from a look at seating charts for those tours up to the point where they were canceled. Although Post Malone sales for his stadium gigs did not look as dire as some of the other canceled tours. They also mentioned that Dolly Parton announced the cancellation of her Las Vegas residency. Those were all sold out. And she actually is quite old, so I believe that she was telling the truth that it was because of health issues in that case.

[00:07:13]Um but there are even more examples as I looked into this.

[00:07:19]They also mention um another artist Culture Wall. He said singer.

[00:07:27]>> Um Amber Mark then T-Pain was also on the list. The Rolling Stones, that actually surprised me.

[00:07:37]Um because it's really those acts from like that the Gen Xers and the boomers like the most that did the best sales for live music and their fans have the most disposable income.

[00:07:51]Um and Neil Young was on the list. Yeah, and so then I I saw another list that had T-Pain, JP Sax, Cardi B as well.

[00:08:05]Um Lauren Hill.

[00:08:08]Um who else? There were some of these artists that I hadn't heard of before.

[00:08:15]Santigold, Alessia Cara.

[00:08:18]>> You know those are good artists. Yeah, T-Pain is interesting cuz T-Pain had a whole career revival cuz of Twitch and stuff back in the day where he like he's he made a millions of dollars, lost all his money, and then made it all back again with like a second career is basically like an influencer slash musician.

[00:08:37]I'll tell you an artist who definitely could sell out a stadium tour but is being prevented from doing so and it's yay. Mhm. Oh, yeah.

[00:08:48]He's trying to kick off a European tour and his concerts are getting canceled against his will not because of low ticket sales but because the venues are I guess boycotting him. I don't even know what that means. They're getting pressured to cancel his events. It says Kanye's upcoming concerts in both Poland and Switzerland have been canceled as a growing number of European countries have stopped or postponed his performances amid a furor over past anti-Semitic comments.

[00:09:21]>> think it was the venues. I think it was the government were actually but the governments were actually preventing him from entering the countries if I remember correctly. This is a private group, I believe. It says in Switzerland at least Swiss football club FC Basel which which responsible for concerts and events that take place on its Saint Jacob Park grounds told Reuters on Saturday that after reviewing a request for Kanye to perform there in June, it decided against it saying, "We cannot, in accordance with our values, provide a platform for the artist in question within this context." Yeah. That was quite a word salad response. And then, in Poland, they said they would cancel his upcoming concert in June after the Polish culture ministry announced that it was seeking to bar him from performing in the country.

[00:10:10]That sounds like a government organization. The concert by Ye scheduled for 9- the 19th of June, 2026 at Super Auto Silesian Stadium will not take place due to formal and legal reasons, said the venue director. Vague.

[00:10:30]In a press release, yeah. Their culture minister in Poland said that his promotion of Nazism was in manifest contradiction with Poland values and condemned him as an artist who openly declares that he loves Hitler and promotes Nazi ideology and makes money by selling t-shirts emblazoned with the swastika.

[00:10:49]In a country marking marked by the history of the Holocaust, we cannot pretend that this is just entertainment.

[00:10:56]So, I mean, Ye could easily make these countries and these venues a lot of money. He has organic popularity and could sell out a stadium tour in the snap of a finger, but they're not allowing him to do so because he's still blacklisted even after issuing multiple apologies and trying to have a redemption arc. It's not being accepted.

[00:11:22]Yeah.

[00:11:22]>> the rest of these artists, it sounds like there is just genuinely a loss of interest.

[00:11:28]I mean, the economy is bad, [clears throat] too. People can't afford tickets even on first let alone second purchase for most of this stuff. There's just no market for it. And that's I mean, they've had the discussion. I think we've talked about it in IRL that there's less interest in the act of going to concerts than there was before.

[00:11:46]Which is weird cuz we covered a few times the fact that Gen Z is the ones bolstering theater sales right now. They seem to be the ones that are most interested in going to the movies. Um there was a article released today from Variety that was talking about the viewing habits saying like Gen Z is the most consistent where they will buy a streaming service for a month and then cancel.

[00:12:08]Which you know, disposable use kind of indicates why they want to go to the theaters, right? They're not going to watch stuff multiple times or to have it on the back burner. They want to experience it and then move on. So, theaters makes perfect sense. You would think concerts would fall in line in that same avenue.

[00:12:25]Yeah, it's of course more accessible to Gen Z to buy a movie ticket than a concert ticket.

[00:12:32]>> Why? I mean, a a concert ticket, especially if we're talking about some of these bigger acts, is like 10 times more expensive.

[00:12:40]Especially when you count in park- parking.

[00:12:43]Um and the incentive to go with a group of friends who can't afford it either.

[00:12:48]>> Yeah. And drinks.

[00:12:51]And concessions. And it's just it's just not accessible to them. Yeah.

[00:12:56]So. All right.

[00:12:57]>> I think it's it's both a lack of interest and the lack of accessibility at this point. Thanks for watching.

[00:13:03]Listen to full episodes of Pop Culture Crisis on Spotify. Keep up with us on social media and make sure you subscribe and ring that bell so you never miss the show. Bye, guys.