Korean Pop Boy Band BTS Rose Bowl Concerts Reportedly Were the Highest-Grossing Engagements in Stadium History

Korean pop sensation BTS grossed over $50 million from only eight shows in May, including their back-to-back “Love Yourself: Speak Yourself” concert at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, topping the monthly list of tour grosses with the biggest attendees among global superstars, a Billboard report said Thursday.

Citing BoxScore figures, Billboard said the double-header BTS concerts last May 4 and 5 earned $16.6 million and sold 113,040 tickets, making it the single highest-grossing engagement in the Rose Bowl’s BoxScore history.

The score surpassed previous high marks by U2 and Taylor Swift at the venue, and co-headlined concerts by Beyoncé and Jay-Z and Eminem and Rihanna, according to Billboard.

Before the shows, Darryl Dunn, the Bowl’s CEO and General Manager, told Pasadena Now there was “this hype and buzz around this band that we haven’t seen before.” He described the whirlwind of excitement as a phenomenon of a new order for the Stadium.

From their eight shows in May in Pasadena, New York, Chicago, and Sao Paolo, Brazil, BTS grossed US$51.66 million and sold 384,498 tickets, Billboard said.

“This swift sweep of the United States is not only massively impressive for a foreign-language act in the U.S. but places BTS among the most powerful touring artists in the world,” the magazine said.

BTS continues its “Love Yourself: Speak Yourself” tour, with stints in Japan through mid-July.