Ep 184: Pop Music Tourism in the Spotlight as Taylor Swift & Blackpink Fever Grips South East Asia

About This Episode

18 Aug 2023 β€’ 31m21s

South East Asia is abuzz with talk of Tourism Taylornomics as Singapore prepares for the billion-dollar Eras Tour to arrive. Coldplay are also headed to the region, Blackpink are filling soccer stadiums and fans await news of Beyonce’s 2024 tour destinations.

Pop Music Tourism is the region’s breakout story of 2023. The economic windfall for airlines, hotels and tours and experiences players is enormous - as is the boost for destination branding. After Blackpink’s recent Hanoi shows, a city official sent the band a letter to thank them for enhancing the capital’s image “as a peaceful, safe and friendly destination”.

Meanwhile, The Weeknd is producing a Halloween-themed musical show in Singapore, and scores of K-pop bands are escaping the shadow of BTS to draw large crowds. Plus, we discuss a jazz festival in Jakarta (with stages sponsored by a hotel group and a tourism board), performances by Indian stars in KL - and the social media fallout when things go wrong, as recently happened with The 1975’s festival performance in Malaysia.

And we take a quick tour to North East Asia, where festivals in Japan, China, South Korea and Taiwan are drawing huge crowds of concertgoers from home and abroad.

View All Episodes

Latest Episodes Catch up with the pods you may have missed

Play
30 Nov 2023 β€’ 35m42s

Ep 193: Reflections on a Hectic Year of Travel in South East Asia and Beyond, with Vincent Vichit-Vadakan

Just back from Jakarta and Hanoi, respectively, Gary and Hannah can confirm that South East Asian airports are getting busier as the end-of-year travel season nears. So, it’s the perfect time to revisit some key tourism themes in 2023 with Bangkok-based travel journalist Vincent Vichit-Vadakan. Vincent was last on the show in April 2022, when the regional outlook was very different. This year, he has travelled on assignment to over 25 destinations including Singapore and Vietnam on various occasions, plus China, Nepal and Maldives.
Play
9 Nov 2023 β€’ 26m36s

Ep 192: The Top 8 Under-the-Radar Travel & Tourism Talking Points in South East Asia

Could Brunei become a regional aviation hub connecting China and South East Asia? And how might AI, humanoid simulants and an apocalyptic sci-fi landscape boost movie tourism in Thailand? This week, Gary and Hannah have created a list of 8 travel developments that may not make major headlines, but are still highly interesting. These tourism talking points that snuck under the radar take us from Singapore to Brunei, Indonesia to China and Thailand to Japan.