Ypatrick, you sound like the kind of person that would win a Jaguar in a raffle and then complain because there is a small scratch on the fender.
Look at the big picture.

As for this big hit/no big hit thing it has nothing to do with packed stadiums. Stones songs don't chart in the U.S anymore. Criticize the Stones if you want but ask yourself why Springsteen, McCartney, Dylan etc. songs don't chart here. Because of the music scene in the U.S.. No older acts chart here anymore. Crap rap and crappier hip hop dominate the charts.

Last time I checked the 2005 U.S. tour was mostly packed houses- maybe all sellouts. There was no big hit then.

> the stadiums in Europe were packed. I did attend 6 shows in Europe,

Where have you been, the worst? I have been to some shows, too and the only ones that seem to sell well have been the 2 Twickenham shows. They even had to cancel shows in Germany because of very bad ticket sells!

melillo Wrote:
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> they make more money and more attendance since 89
> cause the tours are longer and the prices are
> higher, not because there is more demand to see
> them

Well they can only charge what people are willing to pay. There is no law that says people have to go see the Stones. As far as longer tours go, I think the U2 Vertigo tour will end up having more shows but will most likely be outdone by the ABB tour. Isn't that an accomplishment in itself for the Stones? No matter what you think of U2, they have to be the second best active band and they will be beat by a bunch of guys approaching senior citizenship.

Green Day can tour from now until 2012 and still wont gross 400 million. The Stones are a high grossing act because an awful lot of poeple are willing to spend an awful lot of money to see them. Length of tour is also dictated by demand.

rknuth Wrote:
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> > the stadiums in Europe were packed. I did attend
> 6 shows in Europe,
>
> Where have you been, the worst? I have been to
> some shows, too and the only ones that seem to
> sell well have been the 2 Twickenham shows. They
> even had to cancel shows in Germany because of
> very bad ticket sells!

The average show in Europe drew nearly 50,000. That's not good attendance? You are using the faulty logic that if a stadium holds 80,000 and only is filled up to 60,000 that is bad sales. Poppycock.

rknuth wrote:

(A) "Where have you been, the worst? I have been to some shows, too and the only ones that seem to sell well have been the 2 Twickenham shows."

Guys, sorry, what the hell does mean "i have been" to these or other shows? If you have been to Vienna and Berlin you could conclude that the whole sales in Europe were bad. If you have been to the 11 gigs for which had been sold more than 90% of the available tickets, the conclusion could be that the Stones sold everywhere almost perfectly. Both conclusions would be childish, of course. How can we judging the things that way?
The whole picture in Europe: tickets sold 87% of the capacity, average attendance almost 48,000. In the rest of the planet the numbers were even better, of course. Much better. Well, if anyone considers these sales as "bad", fine, he has the right...

( "They even had to cancel shows in Germany because of very bad ticket sells!"

Actually you have right. So what? Nothing new as for european countries at which Football World Cup takes place. In France 1998, the situation was much worse: Three out four (!) gigs canceled due to slow ticket sales. Then they played only Stade De France (1). Italy 1990, they canceled Turin (2) because of bad ticket sales. And, don't forget, in 1990 and 1998 World Cup was a less dangerous "enemy". Why? Because the WC's attendance was lower - i mean stadiums and TV- than today. Simple as that.