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The Unstoppable Rolling Stones
When The Rolling Stones kicked off their Hackney Diamonds tour in Houston in 2024, many wondered if they’d lost a step after being off the road for two years, with brand new songs to test out in front of a live audience, all while being fronted by a man on the verge of his 81st birthday. Yet normal rules of time, aging, and physics don’t apply to the Rolling Stones. The band landed at No. 6 overall in 2024’s top worldwide touring acts with $235 million in gross ticket revenue. They played less than half as many shows as Springsteen on their 2024 Hackney Diamonds Tour (20 total), but their tickets cost much more, with an average price of $277.28, averaging 47,100 tickets and $13 million per night, selling 847,800 tickets total.
Mick Jagger can still sing and dance up a storm at 80, which is a triumph for him and provides a vicarious thrill for anyone who attends a Rolling Stones concert. The 61-year-old band’s 2024 tour is being sponsored by AARP, which until 1999 was known as the American Association of Retired Persons. Both bands keep rolling through the decades with incredible durability despite adversity, winning plaudits for energetic performances despite their ages (Mick Jagger is 81).
Bruce Springsteen’s Remarkable Endurance
Bruce Springsteen and his E Street Band were rock’s biggest earners in 2024, landing at No. 1 overall with a gross of over $380 million from 44 shows, with an average ticket price of $150.69, averaging 37,900 tickets and $5.7 million per night and moving 1.667 million tickets total. His just-completed world tour with the E Street Band has proven to be the most successful of his career with a gross of more than $700 million. The tour spanned 129 shows and two continents from 2023 to 2025, making almost $730 million over its run, more than doubling the $347 million earned by his previous top-grossing tour, selling 4.9 million tickets across its dates.
Beginning with a three-show run in Manchester, England, these 16 scheduled dates served as the finale to a tour that’s been deemed “the greatest show on earth” (Billboard) and “a masterclass in the uplifting power of rock-and-roll” (Washington Post). Beginning in February 2023, with the first shows in six years, the current run of 130 dates has sold over 4 million tickets across continents and been named Pollstar’s Rock Tour of the Year (2024). The tour was Springsteen and the E Street Band’s most successful tour ever, grossing $729.7 million from 4.9 million tickets sold in 129 reported dates, ranking as one of the highest-grossing tours of all time, with Springsteen becoming one of five artists to gross over $2.3 billion from touring in his career.
Paul McCartney’s Ageless Magic
The remaining Beatles are both in their 80s with Ringo Starr at 84 and Paul McCartney at 82, and both have been very active, including touring. The legendary Beatle has always defied his age, still able to play a three-hour show while traveling the globe and keeping busy. His voice is still superb, and musically, he commands any instrument at his disposal, and can be found collaborating or jamming with some of the biggest names in music on a regular basis.
The Got Back tour was McCartney’s first series of live shows since 2019, and on the final stop of the North American leg on June 16, 2022 at MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford, New Jersey, McCartney was joined on stage by New Jersey-born musicians Bruce Springsteen and Jon Bon Jovi, with Springsteen performing “Glory Days” and the Beatles’ “I Wanna Be Your Man,” while Bon Jovi appeared during the encore with balloons singing “Happy Birthday” to McCartney, who turned 80 two days later. The setlist for the Got Back tour consisted of over 30 songs, including songs by the Beatles and Wings, as well as songs from McCartney’s solo career, with each concert running for around 2 hours and 40 minutes.
The Health Challenges Behind the Music
Constant touring is a double-edged sword: A fractured larynx and other vocal cord problems caused “Dream On” singer Steven Tyler (age 76) to retire from Aerosmith last summer, while Bruce Springsteen’s peptic ulcer denied him months of tour dates in 2023. As of now, Bon Jovi and Tyler are taking a break from touring due to various health problems involving their voices, with Tyler recovering from a fractured larynx, which largely impacts his singing abilities.
David Remnick tallied the various maladies that the E Streeters have suffered throughout the years: guitarist Nils Lofgren has had both hips replaced, drummer Max Weinberg has endured open-heart surgery, two failed back operations, prostate cancer treatment, and seven hand operations, with Lofgren comparing the backstage area to ‘a MASH unit’ with ice packs, heating pads, Bengay tubes, and masseuses on call, while Jon Landau, Springsteen’s manager and closest friend, was recovering from brain surgery. Ann Wilson has endured much during her life including substance abuse, weight and body-image issues, and in 2024, she was diagnosed with cancer while Heart was in the midst of touring, however, Wilson underwent treatment and it appears the 74-year-old legendary singer will be back on stage with her beloved rock outfit in 2025, as through it all, Wilson’s voice remained powerful and magical.
Financial Realities of Rock’s Golden Years
While several stars have said that music is their life and they can’t fathom retiring, financial concerns could be at the forefront of their minds as well. The music industry has changed so much in the past few decades, with streaming services meaning artists do not earn much money for their albums or songs. Touring is a huge way that they make money and some older rock stars have high bills due to health care costs and multiple ex-spouses and kids, so they may not have the option of slowing down.
In the days of physical music sales, aging rock stars could count on compilation albums (like greatest hits) to burnish their legacies, but these days, streaming platforms like Spotify are where rock musicians earn a living on their recorded music. Take rocker Steve Miller (age 81), whose band performed monster hits like “Fly Like an Eagle,” but on the downside of their peak performing years, the Steve Miller Band released 11 compilation albums, of which six were certified Gold and one went 15x Platinum (15 million albums sold). Marc Myers noted that much classic rock is out of sync with contemporary pop, so most classic rockers can’t fill large venues, which means they have to take on large numbers of smaller ones to earn what they need, while those that can are selling their catalogs, but some of these lucrative deals compel them to tour and to sustain visibility and keep catalog hits alive.
The Physical Demands of Rocking Past 70
The bottom line, ultimately, is not age onstage but skill, tenacity, pacing and cultivation of greater emotional depth and finesse when the passing of time limits options once taken for granted, with adaptation, not retirement, being the key. Roger Daltrey turned 80 in March 2024, and while there are some critics and fans who believe he should hang up the mic, the legendary frontman of The Who continues to prove he can still pack a vocal punch. Sure, he takes a different vocal approach to such classics like “Won’t Get Fooled Again,” and the range is not what it was in the past, but as 2024 went on, Daltrey was still delivering two-hour (sometimes longer) live sets without a problem.
When not on the golf course, there’s a good chance Alice Cooper is touring, as “The Godfather of Shock Rock” turned 76 in February 2024 and was touring Europe by autumn. When checking out one of Alice’s entertaining live performances, it’s hard to tell if the years and vocal mileage have done anything to hinder his voice and ability to perform. Huey Lewis, the lead singer in The News, has not been able to tour since 2018 because of an inner-ear disorder called Meniere’s disease, while for Slayer bassist and singer Tom Araya, whose band concluded its farewell tour in 2019, retirement was prompted by neck surgery that prevented him from continuing to engage in headbanging while he performed, saying “It just gets harder and harder to come back out on the road; 35 years is a long time.”
Farewell Tours That Never End
Another band caught in an endless farewell tour is the legendary shock-rockers, KISS. Their “End of The Road” tour began in 2019 and was supposed to conclude in 2021, but due to the pandemic, all plans went awry, with the band canceling many shows, and at the ones they did perform, fans suspected their idols were using lip-syncing and backing tracks. It’s hard to pinpoint whether it’s related to some respiratory infections or simple exhaustion due to their age (most of KISS’s members are over 70), nevertheless, the band promised that this year their tour would wrap up with a 100% guarantee, and after the summer leg in Europe, KISS held two dozen shows in the US and Canada before concluding their spectacular journey where it all began in their hometown of New York.
“I’m a big believer that it’s better to leave early than stay too late,” said Kiss singer and guitarist Paul Stanley. “We’re such big fans of the band that we don’t want to see it continue at any other level except prime… It’s out of respect for Kiss, and our fans, that we have to stop.” Stanley, now 71, shared those thoughts in a 2001 Union-Tribune interview during Kiss’ farewell tour, but by 2003, the band was back on the road with a revamped lineup and has since done more than a dozen other tours. Springsteen addressed rumors of a farewell tour, saying, “We ain’t doing no farewell tour bullshit. Jesus Christ, no farewell tour for the E Street Band! Hell no! Farewell to what?”
Rock Icons Defying Time
Iconic frontwoman Debbie Harry, now approaching 80, still oozes insouciant cool and absolutely nails the vocals in a live setting. The band are currently working on the follow-up to 2017’s Pollinator, with former Sex Pistol Glen Matlock filling in on bass, and have a number of tour dates set for 2024. The 76-year-old Stevie Nicks has been touring for parts of five decades, and it’s quite possible she will add another decade to her resume before she calls it a career. What’s more impressive, is that Nicks hasn’t released a studio album of new material in more than 10 years, however, Nicks has managed to remain highly relevant thanks to her embrace of modern-day female pop and rock stars, thus opening the door for a live tour that began in 2023.
At age 74, Stevie Wonder continues to play, sound and move like he’s in his 30s. In 2021, he appeared in Questlove’s wonderful documentary Summer of Soul, one year later, Wonder released his 15th studio album Talking Book, then in 2024, he released the single “Can We Fix Our Nation’s Broken Heart” and performed his classic “Higher Ground” at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago. In 2023, the 74-year-old Peter Gabriel released I/O, his 10th studio album and first in 21 years, Gabriel toured off the record, to rave reviews, which should not have been a surprise. There are just some artists who can deliver the goods, especially vocally, no matter how much the years add up, as Gabriel has consistently provided backing vocals and collaborated with countless of artists since his solo heyday of the 1980s and into the ’90s.
The Emotional Depth of Seasoned Performers
While many rock stars of his vintage seem intent on chasing former glories, Robert Plant has always seemed content to reinvent himself at every turn. Jagger has lost two close friends and collaborators in recent years with longtime bandmate Charlie Watts dying in 2021, and Tina Turner passing away in May, while Springsteen has gotten his affairs in order and cashed out by selling his catalog for a whopping $550 million, ensuring his family will be taken care of long after his death, and his 2020 album Letter to You saw The Boss paying tribute to late friends Clarence Clemons, Danny Federici and George Theiss while pondering his own mortality.
Rob Weiner, a pop culture librarian at Texas Tech University added, “There are always naysayers who think these legacy acts should give it up, but people keep going to see these acts whose best work and performance ability is far behind them. Everybody has had health issues, so I do think audiences can be forgiving… Musicians are a unique breed. They often just keep going and going. They don’t or can’t do anything else. There is something that drives them beyond retirement age.” Mitchell has been in such poor health for so long that the Newport performance was her first live set in two decades. She sounded impressive, no doubt, but she’s not exactly spry.
The Next Generation of Aging Rockers
Two of our best solo artists really are ’70s singer-songwriters. James Taylor and Jackson Browne are both 76, and turning 77 this year, 2025. The remaining Eagles are all 77: Timothy B. Schmit, Don Henley, and Joe Walsh. Eagles (Don Henley, age 77) will continue a Las Vegas residency through the spring, Eric Clapton (age 79) has booked 14 concerts through the fall, and Rod Stewart (age 80) will appear in 49 concerts through August.
Peter Frampton turned 74 in April, and celebrated by going out on a 2024 tour of North America. The singer/guitarist has never let age define him, or keep him from playing live, which after all, is the reason he became a star in the first place through his 1976 Frampton Comes Alive. In addition, Frampton has released two studio records since 2021, though the most recent, Frampton Forgets the Words, was an instrumental project. Willie Nelson is 91 and still performing.
The Science of Aging Gracefully on Stage
Why is it expected that jazz and blues artists grow better with age, while musicians who play rock, a genre created by young people for young people that is defined in part by its physicality, often face an uphill battle of steadily decreasing returns? There are plenty of other musicians out there refusing to let their age be anything other than a number. Here are 12 rock icons still delivering the goods in their 70s and 80s.
Age has become an irrelevance, particularly for top-tier rockers. Jagger and Springsteen both certainly look good for their age, and the fact that they’re still touring is impressive, but no one would argue they’re performing at the same level they were when they were in their prime. It’s a long time since Alice Cooper sang about the tribulations of being 18 but the shock-rock legend has always had a timeless quality to his music, shows and third-person persona. Unlike some on this list he’s never really stopped, carving out 29 albums with the original Alice Cooper band and as a solo artist, these albums have maintained a remarkable consistency but it’s for his theatrical live shows that the Coop is best known and they’re as mind-blowing as ever, as he’s busy throughout 2024, appearing at the new traveling Australian festival Pandemonium, doing the rounds at the Euro festival circuit and continuing the Freaks On Parade tour alongside his spiritual offspring Rob Zombie.
These aging rock legends aren’t just survivors of a bygone era. They’re active participants in keeping the flame of rock and roll burning bright. Their weathered faces tell stories of decades on the road, but their voices still carry the power to move audiences to tears or make them dance like teenagers again. While the music industry has changed dramatically, these artists have adapted, finding new ways to connect with fans while honoring their musical legacy. The fact remains that good music is timeless, and true talent doesn’t fade with age. What do you think about these aging rockers still commanding the stage? Tell us in the comments.
Christian Wiedeck, all the way from Germany, loves music festivals, especially in the USA. His articles bring the excitement of these events to readers worldwide.
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