No-fuss Prince arrives, entertains and leaves

Prince, one of the big five who can sell out a tour at short notice. Source: Supplied

AFTER playing to more than 100,000 people in less than three weeks in a three-city tour that grossed more than $12 million, Prince yesterday boarded his jet to return to his home near Minneapolis in the US.

Just eight weeks after his Welcome 2 tour was announced the 53-year-old pop star has completed what will go down as one of the shortest, most low-fuss tours of a star to this country. Tour promoter Garry Van Egmond says the only other tour ever run like this in Australia happened in 2002, the last time Prince came to town.

Big stadium and arena tours are usually announced six to nine months in advance to give promoters enough time to build marketing campaigns that reach a large enough audience to sell the number of tickets required to offset the cost of staging the tour. Van Egmond says Prince is one of about five international acts who could sell 100,000 tickets so quickly. The others? Madonna, Coldplay, Elton John and U2.

"He just sent me an email sometime in March asking me if I wanted to be his promoter," Van Egmond says. "I felt confident he would sell the tickets and we structured the deal around that."

Within six weeks Van Egmond and co-promoter Michael Chugg had booked five gigs, two each in Melbourne and Sydney and one in Brisbane. Five containerloads of gear were packed on a ship that took 22 days to arrive in Sydney, where the first show was performed at Allphones Arena Homebush on May 11.

When the initial dates quickly sold out another show was booked in each city, making a total eight-show tour. All concerts sold out, except for the third Sydney show for which a few hundred seats remained available.

Van Egmond says the fact the tour was performed in the round enabled bigger audiences in the stadiums, avoiding the lost seating that accompanies building a stage. With 100,000 tickets sold for between $100 and $150, gross sales will amount to an estimated $12.5 million. At each show 120 people each paid $450 to sit next to the stage in a cabaret-style "purple zone".

Prince did no interviews, other than answering on Wednesday morning what sounded like an unplanned call from one of the dancers in his show live on Triple M in Melbourne.

He played three unadvertised but much-speculated upon after parties at clubs in each of the cities he performed in. Melbourne's Herald Sun reported Prince called the manager of Bennett's Lane live club at 11pm on Monday and performed there two hours later, only calling it quits at 4.30am. Van Egmond, who promoted AC/DC's huge Black Ice tour and the record-setting Dire Straits Brothers in Arms tour, says, "That's just the way he works".

With 100,000 tickets sold for between $100 and $150, gross sales will amount to an estimated $12.5 million. At each show 120 people each paid $450 to sit next to the stage in a cabaret-style "purple zone".

95% of the tickets were Gold tickets... $180.

vegasE said:

With 100,000 tickets sold for between $100 and $150, gross sales will amount to an estimated $12.5 million. At each show 120 people each paid $450 to sit next to the stage in a cabaret-style "purple zone".

95% of the tickets were Gold tickets... $180.

Yup,

And the shows weren't all sell outs...The second Brisbane show had at least 1 Purple Reserve Section ($350 each) which had around 100 seats...with about 10 people siting in them. There were definitley gaps, particularly in the more expensive seats.

I just wonder if this actually helped get two aftershows! 600 people @ $100 each is $60,000 cash...they probably only said cash on the door and limited to 600 people so they could let in another 400 and not report the income to the tax man! The extra cash in hand maybe made Brisbane commercially viable, otherwise it may not have got a second (or even first) main show.

^ I was going to mention that the second Brisbane show was defenitely not sold out. There were plenty of empty seats. The atmosphere didn't suffer from it though.

That's pretty cool but I would suspect there are more than 5 international acts other than the ones listed that can sell 100,000 tickets so quickly.

Springsteen, Radiohead, Bon Jovi come to mind.

Milty said:

That's pretty cool but I would suspect there are more than 5 international acts other than the ones listed that can sell 100,000 tickets so quickly.

Springsteen, Radiohead, Bon Jovi come to mind.

One Erection...err...Direction

FunkmasterF said:

vegasE said:

95% of the tickets were Gold tickets... $180.

Yup,

And the shows weren't all sell outs...The second Brisbane show had at least 1 Purple Reserve Section ($350 each) which had around 100 seats...with about 10 people siting in them. There were definitley gaps, particularly in the more expensive seats.

I just wonder if this actually helped get two aftershows! 600 people @ $100 each is $60,000 cash...they probably only said cash on the door and limited to 600 people so they could let in another 400 and not report the income to the tax man! The extra cash in hand maybe made Brisbane commercially viable, otherwise it may not have got a second (or even first) main show.

Yeah, your probably right, but it is the promoter talking afterall, that's what they do for a living.(especially if they want the next tour)

There's no doubt the tour was successful even without a total full house(full enough) for the final Sydney & Brisbane shows.

I'm pretty sure everyone in the foodchain is happy with their cut.

[Edited 6/2/12 8:42am]