The Weeknd upscales his four-city tour of Australia and New Zealand following “unprecedented demand” for tickets.
Last month, the Canadian R&B star announced four shows in total, visiting each of Australia’s big three east coast cities — Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane — and including a single date in Auckland, NZ.
On Monday (Sept. 4), that itinerary ballooned to 10 shows across those four sites.
Produced by Live Nation, the Weeknd’s After Hours Til Dawn Tour will now include three concerts at Sydney’s Accor Stadium (the first two are sellouts) and Melbourne’s Marvel Arena, with two for Brisbane’s Suncorp Stadium. As previously reported, special guests on all dates are Mike Dean and Chxrry22.
On completion of the Australia run, he’ll head to New Zealand where he’ll now play two December dates at Auckland’s Eden Park.
Since the Aug. 22 tour announcement, appetite for the Weeknd’s music has doubled across streaming music platforms, sending a string of his recordings up the ARIA Charts. According to the charts compiler ARIA, The Highlights this week holds at No. 3; former leaders Starboy lifts 18-4, After Hours is up 27-17, Dawn FM climbs 65-25 and Beauty Behind The Madness bounces 93-38 (all via Universal).
Ticketing giants Ticketek and Ticketmaster have reported impressive traffic on their respective platforms. Ticketmaster queue for the Melbourne dates was at 122,000 when the first presale started, reps say. When the first allocation was exhausted, more than 100,000 Melbourne fans remained in the queue.
On the other side of the ditch, Ticketmaster NZ reports the highest number of unique users and page views for any announce this year, including 165,000 users, 647,000 page views. Also, presale demand from both Vodafone Australia and One NZ customers was unprecedented in their history.
Though impressive, the Weeknd’s 10-date stadium jaunt across both markets is dwarfed by Ed Sheeran’s Divide tour of 2018, during which he played 18 stadium concerts across Australia and New Zealand, selling more than a one million tickets, a new record, and beating AC/DC’s old mark for stadium dates on a single tour (14).
The Weeknd’s ‘After Hours Til Dawn Tour 2023’ Australia and New Zealand:
Nov. 20 — Suncorp Stadium, Brisbane
Nov. 21 — Suncorp Stadium, Brisbane
Nov. 24 — Accor Stadium, Sydney (*sold out)
Nov. 25 — Accor Stadium, Sydney (*sold out)
Nov. 27 — Accor Stadium, Sydney
Dec. 1 — Marvel Stadium, Melbourne
Dec. 2 — Marvel Stadium, Melbourne
Dec. 4 — Marvel Stadium, Melbourne
Dec. 7 – Eden Park, Auckland
Dec. 8 — Eden Park, Auckland
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