I have never been to a Trans-Siberian Orchestra show or listened to their music. Neither, to my knowledge, has anyone that I know. They’re kind of like the Nickelback of prog metal in that way; I know they’re massively, massively popular despite never encountering anyone who claims to be a fan. Perhaps that comparison is a bit unfair — TSO have way more artistic merit than Nickelback — but you’d think, like, at least one weirdo prog friend of mine would be totally stoked on that night’s TSO show or whatever. But nope!

But I’m here today with our yearly reminder that TSO are one of the biggest bands in the world: through 105 shows, stretching between November 17th and December 31st of last year, the long-running holiday-themed prog band grossed $56.9 million in ticket sales. Holy. Fucking. Shit.

If you’re wondering how the band performed 105 times in just six weeks, it’s because they’ve actually got two touring “troupes” that can play the same show simultaneously. As such, they played in 61 cities in a 45-day period, culminating in twin New Year’s Eve performances in Seattle and Cleveland. The tour sold more than 927,000 tickets in total.

And that $56.9 doesn’t even include merch sales. They must CLEAN UP at the merch booths, whatwith TSO being sold as a family-friendly event and all.

AND and, they just released an album called The Ghosts of Christmas Eve immediately prior to this tour. It debuted at #6 on the overall Billboard chart and #2 on both the rock and holiday album charts. In other words: it, too, sold well.

tl;dr version: Trans-Siberian Orchestra make a fuckton of money. Anyone wanna get into the holiday-themed prog band business with me? I’ve got a pretty shitty metal website for I could trade as collateral if you’re interested.