Music tourism generated £6.6bn of spending in the UK in 2022, attracting more than 14 million international and domestic tourists to live events, a report has found.
Figures show a resurgence for the live music industry in the first full year of festivals, gigs and concerts following the suspension of events during the COVID pandemic.
It was helped by the return of Glastonbury Festival after two years away and UK tours from home-grown artists including Ed Sheeran, Dua Lipa, Harry Styles, and Sir Elton John, as well as big international acts including Diana Ross, Billie Eilish and Lorde.
Image: Glastonbury was back in 2022 after two years away
The report – called Here, There and Everywhere – has been published by UK Music, an organisation representing the interests of the production side of the UK’s commercial music industry.
It found 1.1 million foreign tourists visited the UK to attend live music events in 2022.
Meanwhile, domestic music tourists (those who already live in the UK but travelled the country to attend an event) accounted for 13.3 million people.
According to the report, a total of 30.6 million people went to concerts in 2022, which included everything from arena shows to grassroots gigs.
Image: Dua Lipa toured in 2022. Pic: Matt Crossick/Global/Shutterstock
In a further positive sign for an industry that was severely hit by job losses over the pandemic, due to cancelled shows and closing venues, the report found the resurgence of gigs helped sustain 56,000 jobs.
And 2023 is already looking to be a big year for UK gigs, with shows from Blur, The 1975 and Maroon 5, as well as the British Summer Time Festival in Hyde Park drawing huge audiences.
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However UK Music chief executive Jamie Njoku-Goodwin had a word of warning.
Calling music “one of our country’s great assets”, he said: “While music generates huge benefits for our local areas, the infrastructure and talent pipeline that it relies on still faces huge challenges.
“With a venue closing every week and one in six festivals not returning since the pandemic, many studios facing huge challenges, it’s vital that we protect the musical infrastructure that does so much for our towns and cities.”
The Music Venue Trust – which represents more than 900 grassroots music venues across the UK – said grassroots music venues are closing at the rate of one a week amid the cost of living crisis.
Some fear the closures will mean emerging artists with the potential to be the next Ed Sheeran or Adele – both of whom started out playing in grassroots venues – could find their careers cut off at ground level, never realising their full potential.
Bob Vylan’s frontman has said he does not regret chanting “death, death to the IDF” at Glastonbury – and would do it again.
The outspoken punk duo sparked controversy with their performance at the festival in June, with the broadcast also leading to fierce criticism of the BBC.
But speaking on The Louis Theroux podcast, Bobby Vylan said he stood by the chant, adding: “I’d do it again tomorrow, twice on Sundays.”
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BBC bosses grilled over Masterchef, Bob Vylan and Gaza documentary
Vylan claimed this backlash is “minimal” compared with what the people of Palestine are going through – with many losing members of their family or forced to flee their homes.
He said: “If I have their support, they’re the people that I’m doing it for, they’re the people that I’m being vocal for, then what is there to regret. Oh, because I’ve upset some right-wing politician or some right-wing media?”
The musician revealed he was taken aback by the uproar caused by the chant, which was described by the prime minister as “appalling hate speech”.
Vylan added: “It wasn’t like we came off stage, and everybody was like (gasps). It’s just normal. We come off stage. It’s normal. Nobody thought anything. Nobody. Even staff at the BBC were like: ‘That was fantastic! We loved that!'”
A spokesperson at Mindhouse Productions – which was founded by Theroux and produces The Louis Theroux podcast – told Sky News: “Louis is a journalist with a long history of speaking to controversial figures who may divide opinion. We would suggest people watch or listen to the interview in its entirety to get the full context of the conversation.”
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Theroux asked Vylan what he meant by chanting “death to the IDF” – with the musician replying: “It’s so unimportant, and the response to it was so disproportionate.
“What is important is the conditions that exist to allow that chant to even take place on that stage. And I mean, the conditions that exist in Palestine. Where the Palestinian people are being killed at an alarming rate.”
He said he wanted an end to the oppression that the Palestinian people are facing – but argued chanting “end, end the IDF” wouldn’t have caught on because it doesn’t rhyme.
“We are there to entertain, we are there to play music,” Vylan added. “I am a lyricist. ‘Death, death to IDF’ rhymes. Perfect chant.”
He went on to reject claims that their set had contributed to a spike in antisemitic incidents that were reported a couple of days later.
“I don’t think I have created an unsafe atmosphere for the Jewish community. If there were large numbers of people going out and going like ‘Bob Vylan made me do this’. I might go, ‘oof, I’ve had a negative impact here’.”
Vylan’s conversation with Theroux was recorded on 1 October – before the Manchester synagogue attack, and prior to the ceasefire in Gaza coming into effect.
A security guard jailed for plotting to kidnap, rape and murder TV star Holly Willoughby has lost an appeal against his life sentence.
Gavin Plumb was sentenced to life with a minimum term of 16 years last year after being convicted of soliciting murder and encouraging or assisting others to rape and kidnap.
A trial at Chelmsford Crown Court heard that police found bottles of chloroform and an “abduction kit” with cable ties when officers raided the 38-year-old’s flat in Harlow, Essex.
Plumb’s kidnap plan involved attempting to “ambush” Willoughby at her family home, jurors heard.
Plumb argued in his defence that it was just online chat and fantasy.
Image: Police believed Plumb was an ‘imminent threat’ to Holly Willoughby. Pic: PA
He was caught after an undercover police officer in the US infiltrated an online group called Abduct Lovers.
He told the officer, who used the pseudonym David Nelson, that he was “definitely serious” about his plot to kidnap the former This Morning host, leaving him with the impression that there was an “imminent threat” to Willoughby.
Due to the officer’s concern over Plumb’s post, evidence was passed to the FBI, who then contacted police in the UK.
Willoughby, who asked for her victim personal statement to be private, waived her right to anonymity in connection with the charge against Plumb of assisting or encouraging rape.
This breaking news story is being updated and more details will be published shortly.
Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs is appealing the conviction handed down to him earlier this year over prostitution charges relating to his former girlfriends and male sex workers.
He was cleared of more serious charges of racketeering conspiracy and sex-trafficking that could have put him in jail for life.
The two-page formal notice of appeal, seen by Sky News, was filed in Manhattan federal court on Monday, confirming he will be challenging both his conviction and his sentence.
It lists Combs’s defence council as Alexandra A E Shapiro, and shows a $605 (£450) docketing fee was paid to lodge the formal notice.
More detailed filings are expected to follow.
On the day of sentencing in early October the rapper’s lawyers had signalled they intended to appeal.
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Combs, 55, has been in custody since his arrest last year.
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Diddy jailed for more than four years
His seven-week trial earlier this year included four days of testimony from Cassie, now Cassie Ventura Fine, who told the court she was coerced and sometimes blackmailed into sexual encounters with male sex workers, referred to as “freak offs”.
Jurors were also shown video clips of Combs dragging and beating her in a Los Angeles hotel hallway after one of those sessions in 2016.
Ahead of the sentencing, Cassie also submitted a letter to the judge, calling Combs a “manipulator” and saying she would fear for her safety should he be immediately released.
Image: Diddy and Cassie at the premiere for a film she starred in, just days after the 2016 hotel incident. Pic: zz/Galaxy/STAR MAX/IPx/ AP
Ahead of his sentencing, Combs told the court he admitted his past behaviour was “disgusting, shameful and sick”, and apologised personally to Cassie Ventura and “Jane”, another former girlfriend who testified anonymously during the trial.
He told the court he’d got “lost in my excess and lost in my ego”, but since his time in prison he has been “humbled and broken to my core,” adding “I hate myself right now… I am truly sorry for it all.”
Judge Arun Subramanian, who had rejected bail for the rapper several times before sentencing, told him that he would get through his time in prison and would still “have a life afterwards,” calling it “a chance for renewal and redemption”.
He was facing a maximum of 20 years in prison for the prostitution-related charges, so the sentence was towards the lower end of the scale.
Prosecutors had argued he should spend at least 11 years behind bars, while Combs’s lawyers had called for him to be freed almost immediately due to time already served since his arrest just over a year ago.
Sky News has contacted Combs’s lawyers for comment.