Local Acts Top Concert Charts

The rankings are not based on tickets sold, but rather on seating capacities of the venues where the acts performed. So-called fan-meets were also included in the numbers for the first time.

Though there are still two months left in the year, concerts that will take place in November and December are included in the numbers because, again, capacity is the operational concept for the ranking. Early next year, Nikkei will publish another list based on actual concert revenues and tickets sold.

The Mobilization Power Ranking lists 50 artists and all are either Japanese or Korean. No. 1 is the veteran K-pop boy band Big Bang, which put on 60 concerts for a total attendance of 1,859,000.

Big Bang has just announced that it is suspending activities because one of its members is leaving to complete his mandatory military service. The rest of the Top 10 is filled out by Japanese idol groups, with the No. 2 slot belonging to Arashi (32 concerts/989,000 attendees). Arashi is the premier act of Johnny and Associates, the powerhouse Japanese talent agency that specializes in male idols.

Johnny’s boasts seven acts on the list, while the Exile stable of Japanese R&B singers and dancers placed three – with two in the top 10 – and the AKB stable of idol teenage girl groups, which dominates CD sales in Japan, counted three acts as well. There were nine K-pop acts on the list. There were also a number of straightforward rock acts, all Japanese, including Bump of Chicken (No. 18), The Yellow Monkey (No. 21), Sekai no Owari (No, 22), Golden Bomber (No. 42) and Glay (No. 44).

Though Western pop acts tend to make more money per concert, they rarely play more than two or three shows when they come to Japan, so they would not make this list but probably will show up on the revenues list. Most of the acts listed on the Mobilization Power Ranking tend to play arenas and stadiums.