Live music has hit a milestone: shows topped $6 billion for the first time, according to Pollstar. Its worldwide touring rankings put South Korea’s BTS on top (This video contains AI-assisted
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AUSTIN, Texas – I have a soft spot for hard rock. So I find myself in one of Austin’s live music clubs listening to a band on the tail end of their world tour.
A guitarist is under the stage lights at Come and Take It Live, swaying and concentrating, the strains of a Stevie Ray Vaughan classic floating from the amps. The night air crackles. The rapt audience takes it in, applauding as the guitarist moves gracefully through the soulful notes. If you’ve played a musical instrument of any kind at any skill level, the live show reveals the human effort at the foundation of every good performer, performance and song. As a mediocre drummer, I tend to watch that part of most shows, whoever the band is. The drummer in this show is effortlessly throwing out some amazing double-bass rolls.
Rock ‘n’ roll is an American invention that’s gone global. Nights like this have been happening across Austin, and across the country and the world, for generations, long before and after we sadly lost the great Texas firebrand.
SRV was such a phenomenon there’s a statue of him downtown. It’s appeared in thousands of Instagram Reels and photos by now, especially during SXSW and ACL fests. Music is the heartbeat of the city. The guitar legend was the king of live music, and live music is still big. In fact, according to Pollstar, while we stream our favorite movies and songs into our homes, going out to watch live music has never been bigger.
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AC/DC singer Brian Johnson and AC/DC guitarist Angus Young are seen during a concert at the Estadio Wanda Metropolitano on July 12, 2025, in Madrid. (Ricardo Rubio/Europa Press via Getty Images)
Pollstar’s numbers reveal something in the age of AI, digital everything, on-demand and streaming: We still want real moments we can experience with others. In a world that increasingly feels all the same, we want to feel a beat. When a band we like hits the chorus of that song we love and everyone around us is singing along – that’s it.
Revenue from live music shows topped $6 billion for the first time, and “The Worldwide Top 100 Touring Artists for 2026 are on track to have a record-setting year based on reported third-quarter tour revenues and ticket sales between Nov. 13, 2025 and Aug. 12, 2026.” Three quarters, $6 billion – that’s a lot of us going to live shows.
From (L-R): RM, j-hope, Jung Kook and Jimin of BTS perform onstage during the 2026 iHeartRadio Music Festival at T-Mobile Arena on Sept. 18, 2026 in Las Vegas, Nevada. (Denise Truscello/Getty Images for iHeartRadio)
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Topping the worldwide live show chart is South Korea’s K-pop monsters, BTS, with the “Dynamite” boy group racking up over $465 million on their Arirang World Tour. Back from compulsory military service, they are selling out NFL stadiums in major cities. That’s no great surprise to anyone who’s been paying attention to music, but perhaps more surprising is that another K-pop act, TWICE, has joined them in the top 10 at No. 6.
Those talented bands also benefit from South Korea’s “soft power” strategy of using government funds and might to export Korean idol music to the world. It’s clearly working. “The Feels” and “Butter” are two of K-pop’s biggest English-language hits over the last few years – both products of South Korea’s idol pipeline.
More surprising may be the resurgence of rock. Aussie titans AC/DC returned to the road and landed in the top 10 live acts, hauling in over $136 million. They’re very much “Back in Black” at No. 9.
Right behind them? Ed Sheeran. We’ll see where he lands in the next few months.
Others making the top 10 include Bad Bunny, The Weeknd, Lady Gaga and Luke Combs. Taylor Swift didn’t make the list because she didn’t tour during the period when the data was collected.
Taylor Swift performing during the Eras Tour. (Getty Images)
In a time in which the lords of AI keep saying their tech may take our jobs, it’s heartening to see something tech can’t take away. At least, not yet.
KISS revealed digital avatars in their “final” show in a riff on “God Gave Rock and Roll To You” in 2023. Sia has sold off a 50% stake in her catalog and the buyer is aiming at some kind of digital show, and ABBA has already done its hybrid human-digital show in London, called “ABBA Voyage.” Digital presentation is coming for live music, as it has already started impacting digital music via AI-powered platforms on both the streaming and production ends. Will we someday see a triple bill of Elvis, Michael Jackson and Johnny Cash? Maybe! It will be weird, but that doesn’t mean it won’t be tried.
Whatever the future of music is, big business is still betting on live music at all scales being here to stay. Apple just built a 600-seat venue loaded with tech. It can pull in millions. AEG is making a play for clubs like Emo’s in Austin, reopening it with a new name next year. It makes a nice bookend to the other local club AEG is investing in, a larger one with a capacity of 4,000. The Emo’s name itself will live on after moving elsewhere.
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Whether it’s catching your friend’s band in a local bar, which I’ve done, or catching a global act like the British band Muse on tour with Tokyo-based One OK Rock in a major Texas arena, or an up-and-coming band trying to break out, seeing and hearing the result of thousands of hours of toil and effort become a groove you love is rewarding for the artists and the audience. In small venues, you may be within a few yards of the stage. You feel it.
But whether it’s digital or with a living, breathing act on the stage, we still want to be with others who like the same things we do. We want to sing that chorus together.
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And from the local music spot to the strangely authentic country bar in Tokyo, to the massive, highly produced stadium shows helmed by the major acts in the Top 100, the love of music, and especially live music, is global. The sales numbers don’t lie, and neither do the numbers bands play. The amazing guitarist playing those shimmering blue SRV notes in that Austin club is called Iree. She’s one of a pair of brilliant guitarists in a quintet of fiery South Korean rockers called Rolling Quartz, blazing their way around the world one face-melting show at a time. Many of their songs are in English.
Rolling Quartz guitarists Choi Hyunjung (left) and Iree (right) playing at Come and Take It Live in Austin, Texas, on Oct. 4, 2026. (Bryan Preston/Fox News Digital)
