Aussie musicians’ international incomes are at an all-time high. But the picture at home is not so healthy

Australian artists’ international earnings are at an all-time high, but local venues and performances have not recovered post-pandemic, raising fears of a musical “brain drain” overseas, a review of the health of the domestic music industry has found.

The Australasian Performing Right Association and Australasian Mechanical Copyright Owners Society (APRA AMCOS) said homegrown musicians earned a record $86.1 million in performance royalties abroad in the last financial year, up 22.5 per cent from the last financial year and almost doubling since the pandemic.

While artists’ international income is up, the domestic industry has not fully recovered post-pandemic, the report found.Credit: Getty Images

The group, which last year reported about 1300 live music venues in Australia had closed since 2019, said there had been an improvement between 2023 and 2024, with 1067 new licensed venues opening in that time – an increase of 30.7 per cent. But the number of venues and performers is still well below pre-pandemic levels, as are the royalties artists earned from performances in local venues.

APRA AMCOS boss Dean Ormston said a potential consequence is greater numbers of Australian artists relocating overseas to tap into international touring markets. The group already counts 400 members each in Los Angeles and London, 200 in Nashville and 100 in Berlin.

“There are more Australian artists touring and performing internationally than ever before,” he said.

“To make a living, any sort of living, people have got to get up and pack their bags and go somewhere else.”

It comes as a federal inquiry is looking into the challenges facing the industry, following the cancellation of long-running festivals including Groovin the Moo and NSW’s Splendour in the Grass, as well as closures of popular live music venues.

Last week, the inquiry heard from the insurance industry about spiralling premiums – sometimes as much as 10 times higher – for festivals and small- and medium-sized venues. APRA AMCOS, which has given evidence to multiple inquiries into the industry, has joined some venue owners in calling for offsets to payroll tax or land tax requirements.

Australian country musician Fanny Lumsden has adapted her shows to access more Australian audiences, including playing for all ages. Her Story Club tour starts in Robertson, NSW, in October.

Fanny Lumsden, an ARIA award-winning country musician originally from rural NSW, said though she had long since adapted the way she performed to access new audiences in Australia, including performing shows for all ages, it was a difficult time for the industry.

“The medium-sized venues, there’s a bit of a gap there,” she said. Lumsden, who played her first UK show at Glastonbury in 2023, said she had been to the UK and Europe three times in the last 13 months.

Royalties earned across all public performances in Australia (including radio, streaming and television) have not recovered at the same rate as for international performances. APRA AMCOS estimates artists have lost an eye-watering $600 million in domestic income since the start of the pandemic, with local performance earnings down 12.7 per cent on 2019’s figure.

Meanwhile, the ARIA charts have become increasingly dominated by overseas acts. Tim Kelly, a UTS researcher and former music executive with Sony and Universal, analysed charts between 2000 and 2023 and found the average percentage of Australian and New Zealand artists’ singles in the top 100 charts had dropped from 16 per cent in 2000 to just 2.5 per cent in 2023, and albums from 29 per cent to 4 per cent.

APRA AMCOS has praised the success this year of big-name performers such as Kylie Minogue, Troye Sivan and Dom Dolla on international stages and awards shows. But Kelly said if something was not done to address the health of the domestic music industry, the current crop of Australian superstars could be the last.

“There’s an old rule in the music business, if you can’t score at home, it’s really difficult to score away,” he said, noting the impact streaming services like Spotify had in boosting US and UK acts at the expense of homegrown artists.

Chief executive of APRA AMCOS Dean Ormston says there are more Australian musicians touring internationally than ever before.Credit: Peter Braig

“Australian artists are having to go overseas to try and influence playlists to really import that success back into Australia,” he said.

Ormston said the growth in international revenue was a sign of the Australian music industry’s “enormous potential”, saying APRA AMCOS wants it to become a “net exporter” of music, joining the US, UK and surprisingly, Sweden.

“We should be really proud of this industry. Australian songwriters and artists are doing really, really well internationally. There are some things that we need to lean into, and we need to fix, and the live music one is the critical piece of the market” he said.

Lumsden said while for some artists moving overseas was the “right thing to do”, she had never considered following the country music pipeline to Nashville.

“I reckon that would be way more difficult than starting something somewhere like a regional town,” she said.

“We need to tell the Australian stories. We need to sing songs about growing up where we grow up.”

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