U2, Bon Jovi Cake Up On Forbes Highest-Paid Musicians List

Gaga comes in at #4 with $168 mil for the year, while Bieber is the youngest artist on the list.
By Rob Markman

U2's Bono
Photo: Harry Herd/ Getty Images

<P><a href="http://www.forbes.com/pictures/eeel45ehmg/the-worlds-25-highest-paid-musicians#content" target="_blank"><i>Forbes</i></a> released their 2011 World's Highest-Paid Musicians List on Wednesday, and apparently it still pays to be a veteran rocker &#8212; and it pays handsomely. <a href="/news/articles/1655032/bon-jovi-ac-dc-u2-top-world-tours-of-2010.jhtml">U2 topped the list</a>, raking in more than $195 million after their two-year 360 Tour grossed around $700 million, leapfrogging the Rolling Stones' A Bigger Bang Tour as the richest run of all time. Bon Jovi can't be too upset at snagging the list's runner-up spot. The group caked up $125 million in the last year. In a recent interview with <a href="http://www.forbes.com/2011/05/17/celebrity-100-11-jon-bon-jovi-kanye-west-bieber-still-rocking.html%22" target="_blank"><i>Forbes</a>,</i> Jon Bon Jovi recalled the band's early, more humble and less lucrative days jamming in a New Jersey basement with vintage posters on the wall illuminated by candles. "I'm thinking maybe this is an issue, maybe I just don't like them," he said. "Until I realized that all the oxygen was sucked out of the room by the candles ... So I blew out the candles, cranked up the amplifiers and said, 'We're going to be a rock band. If you believe in what I'm telling you, we can be the Rolling Stones." You'd think that Bon Jovi gave a similar speech to Lady Gaga with all the bank that she acquired this year. Coming behind Elton John ($204 million), who landed at #3, Gaga earned $168 million in the past year and would've made more had she been more frugal with the costs of her stage show &#8212; then again she's been known to spare little expense when it comes to pleasing her fans. Paul McCartney, 68, was the oldest artist to make the list, clocking $66 mil, while 17-year-old Justin Bieber was the youngest to make the list with $53 million. Jay-Z and Beyonc&#233; were the only couple to make the list. In fact, for the first time since being married, Hov earned more than his wife, taking home $37 million, while B earned $35 mil. All of the calculated earnings are based off pretax income earned from May 2010 to May 2011, before agents and managers take their cuts, according to <a href="http://blogs.forbes.com/zackomalleygreenburg/2011/06/15/the-worlds-highest-paid-musicians/" target="_blank">Forbes.com</a>.</p>

Related Artists

• Bon Jovi
• U2

Source:
http://www.mtv.com/news/articles/1665955/u2-bon-jovi-fordes-highest-paid.jhtml

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