In 2013, Madonna was music’s top earner, pulling in $125 million; Lady Gaga finished second with $80 million. This year was a completely different story. Gaga dropped to No. 30, taking in $30 million; Madonna fell off the list of the world’s highest-paid musicians altogether. Acts like Beyonce and Taylor Swift surpassed the aforementioned divas, both in terms of earnings and global mind share.
Madonna’s departure actually isn’t necessarily a bad sign for her career. In recent years, she’s followed a boom-and-bust pattern: touring extensively and reaping nine-figure paydays, then taking some time off the road before going out again. Right now, she’s in the former stage, and didn’t play a single show in our June-to-June scoring period.
Gaga played 24, significantly more but nowhere close to her totals during her top earning years. There’s a bit more reason for concern here. Though fans loved ARTPOP, it didn’t achieve the sort of mainstream acclaim her previous efforts did. The ensuing tour grossed $83 million over 74 performances; on the surface, that’s a comparable per-show rate to the $227 million she took in over 200 dates starting in November 2009–but that total included a period before she had achieved peak popularity.
Never thought i'd see the day they were slaying together
Forbes needs to chill I hardly think the guy who wrote the article makes 1/100 of what madonna and gaga made this year.
Furthermore artists who fell from 50M to 30M are not losers but if you fell from 80M to 30M you are a loser ? Cute.
Not concerned. The Cheek to Cheek tour will bring in millions, plus, she'll have all of those $10 bills Tony will slip down the back of her dress in the form of tips.
