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Lady Gaga went bankrupt and was $3 million in debt after her Monster Ball tour
Featured Image Credit: Andrea Raffin / The Photo Access / Alamy Stock Photo

Lady Gaga went bankrupt and was $3 million in debt after her Monster Ball tour

Lady Gaga has won Grammys, Oscars, and toured the world, but she bankrupted herself for one of her earlier live shows

Lady Gaga lost a whole heap of money and was even bankrupted after her ‘Monster Ball’ tour, owing $3 million (£2.5m) in total.

As we all know, she has managed to bounce back from that, enjoying one of the most successful times in her career, which including bagging a heap of Grammys, a Best Original Song Oscar, and a nomination for Best Actress for A Star is Born.

She’s also released albums and toured the world multiple times over since then, so it’s fair to say that her days of financial woe are behind her.

The 36-year-old – who is actually called Stefani Germanotta – first burst onto the musical scene in 2008 with her album The Fame and hasn’t really missed a step yet.

In that time, she’s racked up 13 Grammys in total, a Super Bowl half-time show – without as big a reveal as Rihanna’s, admittedly – and seven concert tours.

Lady Gaga really overspent on her The Monster Ball tour.
PA Images/Alamy Stock Photo

At one stage though, she nearly went bust entirely.

In an interview with the Financial Times, Gaga explained how her second tour actually cost her a whole load of cash.

She said: “I actually went bankrupt after the first extension of The Monster Ball [between 2009 and 2011] and it was funny because I didn’t know!”

She added: “I remember I called everybody and said, ‘Why is every­one saying I have no money? This is ridiculous, I have five No. 1 singles.’

“And they said, ‘Well, you’re $3 million in debt.’”

Yikes.

The 2010 tour left her $3,000,000 in debt.
WENN Rights Ltd./Alamy Stock Photo

According to that FT article, she managed to work her way out of the debt because of the ‘sheer quality and popularity’ of her musical output.

It must be one of the benefits of being a huge pop superstar going bankrupt because of a world tour.

If you’re good enough, you can probably just go on another world tour – or release a new record – to make a bit of dough.

According to Forbes, as of 2020 she was worth $150 million (£120m), but her music career has never been about the money.

She explained: “The beauty for me about being an artist is that the dream will never die, because I’m not obsessed with material things and don’t care about the money and don’t care about the attention of the public, but only the love of my fans, so for me it’s about how much more devoted, how much better an artist can I become.

“It’s honestly true that money means nothing to me."

Don't worry, she's sorted her money troubles out now.
Stills Press/Alamy Stock Photo

There are still purchases that she has had to make that have meant something to her though, including giving her fans the best show they can possibly hope for.

She said: “The only big things I’ve purchased are my dad’s heart valve and a Rolls-Royce for my parents, for their anniversary.

“Other than that, I put everything in the show.”

We won’t ask her to rank those purchases in terms of importance, then.

Topics: Lady Gaga, Celebrity, Music, Entertainment, Money