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The story
YOASOBI is known overseas too — they were even invited to a White House state dinner in 2024 — but ticket sales for their November 14-15 Sapporo Dome shows have been sluggish, prompting vocalist Ikuta Lilas to suddenly perform a street live to promote the concert. On 5ch, posters pointed out that Sapporo Dome has always been a venue only a handful of artists like Arashi or Snow Man can fill, and that streaming numbers and live concert turnout are entirely different things. Others cited structural issues beyond ticket sales, such as the cost of shipping equipment across the Tsugaru Strait and the dome’s notoriously poor acoustics.
Thu, Oct 22, 3:55 PM
YOASOBI is a music duo Japan is proud to showcase to the world. In 2024, they were even invited to a state dinner hosted by then-President Biden at the White House, making them an iconic symbol of J-pop recognized overseas as well.
However, even though they’re riding high at the top of the charts both domestically and internationally, it seems they’re struggling to draw crowds for their live shows. News that vocalist Ikuta Lilas suddenly held a street performance to promote tickets for their Sapporo Dome concerts on November 14 and 15 has been met with surprise.
Source: news.yahoo.co.jp / Original article here
What people said
Old people: 'I don't have the interest.'
This.
I forget which artist it was, but I heard somewhere that some acts hire part-timers or something to pad their numbers.
It's well known that Sapporo doesn't sell out, whether it's combat sports or concerts.
RIZIN flopped there, Breaking Down flopped there too.
Probably even Inoue Naoya's pricier tickets would sell out now, even on a weekday.
Other than that, isn't sports pretty much a no-go there? They don't have baseball anymore (the Fighters left Sapporo Dome for Escon Field).
If even Mrs. GREEN APPLE is struggling, then maybe it really is hopeless.
Even Johnny's, which boasts some of the best drawing power in the country,
carefully picks and chooses which of its groups get to perform there.
Yeah, probably easy for them.
Apparently they're doing 3 days at Sapporo Dome next weekend — isn't that sold out already?
Even Snow Man has said that back in the day they wanted to play Sapporo Dome but their agency shot it down.
Well, but building separate stage sets for an arena versus a dome is a huge hassle.
Rather than running an arena show at a loss just to fill it,
doing the dome — even with the upper deck empty — is probably more economical.
Ah, right, Ohtani could fill it.
It'd basically be a hero's homecoming.
Yeah, maybe that's it.
Yeah, right?
And Inoue and Ohtani, too.
Do video uploaders get that kind of detailed data?
You mean unique viewers?
It's funny to check which country racks up the most views on a given video sometimes — like, 'that's several times the country's entire population.'
The artist also has to cover airfare and hotels for hundreds of staff.
And yet, if you don't pull in 40,000-50,000 people, you're deep in the red. Hokkaido's population can't support that, and mainland fans won't make the trip either because travel costs are too high.
The load-in/load-out logistics for equipment are so bad that staff nearly die just from the setup alone.
On top of that, the dome's acoustics are garbage — the sound bounces around so much that both artists and fans complain about it.
Sapporo Dome really isn't great acoustically, huh? What's up with that?
I guess it's a case of some good songs, some bad songs.
Background and Key Points of This Discussion
Sapporo Dome has a huge capacity, and historically only a handful of major acts — Arashi, Snow Man, Mr.Children, Nogizaka46, and the like — have managed to pull off a successful show there; it’s also known as a venue that struggles to draw crowds even for sports events like combat sports promotions. Hokkaido faces structurally high costs for shipping equipment and staff over from Honshu, meaning a show essentially has to draw tens of thousands of people just to break even. There’s also a point that tends to get overlooked: YouTube view counts measure free, casual viewing, which is fundamentally different from live attendance, where fans pay for tickets and travel to show up in person. Opinions in the thread split between “their popularity itself has declined” and “it’s the venue’s size and costs that are the problem,” with some even suspecting the view counts are inflated — leaving how to interpret the gap between streaming numbers and ticket sales as the central point of debate.
※This article is excerpted and summarized from the 5ch (Geisoku+) thread “Ikuta Lilas Can’t Fill Sapporo Dome Despite 10 Billion Streams — “Is Even YOASOBI’s Fame Not Enough to Sell Tickets?” The Brutal Gap Between Streams and Turnout.”
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