Blink-182 tops Pearl Jam on Billboard's 2016 Top 50 Moneymakers list

Blink-182 tops Pearl Jam on Billboard’s 2016 Top 50 Moneymakers list

July 13, 2017 4:11 PM PT

Beyoncé, Guns N’ Roses and Bruce Springsteen are the highest-earning music stars on Billboard magazine’s Top 50 Moneymakers of 2016 list. Their estimated net incomes last year come out to, respectively, $62.1 million for Beyoncé, $42.3 million for Guns N’ Roses and $42.2 million for Springsteen.

Several former San Diego musicians are also included in the annual Billboard tally.

The Poway-bred punk-pop band blink-182 placed 30th on the list, with estimated 2016 earnings of just over $12 million. Pearl Jam - whose lineup includes former San Diegans Eddie Vedder, Matt Cameron and Mike McCready - came in at No. 43, with a 2016 take of $9.3 million.

In nearly every instance, the Top 50 Moneymakers made the bulk of their earnings from touring.

Beyoncé, who last month gave birth to twins, grossed a whopping $161 million from her 2016 North American “Formation” tour, which included a May 12 concert at San Diego’s Qualcomm Stadium.

The reunion tour by Guns N’ Roses last year included an Aug. 22 Qualcomm show. Springsteen’s 2016 tour with his mighty E Street Band skipped San Diego, where he and the group have not performed together since 1981.

The rest of the Billboard Top 10 is completed by Drake ($37.5 million), Adele ($37 million), Coldplay ($32.3 million), Justin Bieber ($30.7 million), Luke Bryan ($27.3 million), Kanye West ($26.1 million) and Kenny Chesney ($25.4 million).

Coldplay, incidentally, will perform at Qualcomm Stadium on Oct. 8, while Bryan is set to perform at Mattress Firm Amphitheatre on Oct. 27.

Only one Spanish language act, Marc Anthony, made the Billboard list, with 2016 earnings of $9.9 million.

Jimmy Buffett, whose Broadway-bound musical debuted here in May, placed 45th on the list, with $9.1 million.

The 50th spot was claimed by the a cappella group Pentatonix, with $8.2 million.

Together, the Top 50 artists on the Billboard list brought in $890.7 million from touring, publishing, streaming and CD sales- a hefty jump of 34 percent over last year’s total. It was also the first time in nearly two decades that music industry revenue increased for two consecutive years.

Taylor Swift - who topped the 2015, 2013 and 2011 Billboard lists - was a no-show this year.

Here is the complete 2016 Billboard Top 50 Moneymakers list.
george.varga@sduniontribune.com; Twitter @georgevarga

Music

George Varga

San Diego Union-Tribune music critic George Varga began drumming in rock bands at 12 and writing professionally about music at 15. A Louisiana native who grew up mostly in Germany, Varga has earned three Pulitzer Prize nominations for his writing at the U-T and is a voting member of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. In addition to providing live coverage of the Grammy Awards and festivals from Coachella and KAABOO to the 1994 edition of Woodstock, he has interviewed everyone from Miles Davis, Britney Spears and (over a game of chess) Ray Charles to Willie Nelson, Kanye West and Pulitzer Prize-winning composer Anthony Davis. A triple first prize-winner for criticism and arts writing at the 2022 San Diego Press Club awards and a first prize-winner at the 2022 San Diego Society of Professional Journalists awards, Varga is also a contributing writer for Jazz Times magazine and has written for Billboard, Spin and other publications. After attending San Diego City College and San Diego State University, he created and taught the 2002 UC San Diego Extension course, “Jazz in a Post-Ken-Burns World.” Varga has written liner notes for more than a dozen albums, including by jazz sax greats James Moody and Michael Brecker, and contributed two chapters to the book, “Dylan: Disc By Disc.”