Vince Staples breaks down touring costs and why ‘Crybaby’ took years to land

Vince Staples did not show up to Rolling Stone’s live residency to soft-pedal the business of being on the road. At New York’s Cherry Lane Theatre, in a conversation published Wednesday (October 28), he walked through what it actually costs to put a tour together before a single ticket pays you back.

“When you go to work every day, the building is already there. The desk is already there,” he told Rolling Stone’s Jeff Ihaza. “And when you go on tour, nothing exists.” Artists front the bus, the band, insurance, and venue access. “You spend all this money up front and if you don’t sell no tickets, then you don’t make no money. Nobody’s doing that if they don’t like to do it.”

Vince Staples Is Currently On Tour

That line sits next to his other big point from the night. The fact that hip-hop doesn’t really have rules. Genre, he argued, is more of a grocery-aisle label for listeners than a cage for artists. “If you say that utilizing certain sounds is abandoning hip-hop, you don’t know enough about hip-hop to have a conversation about it.”

The album at the center of all this, Crybaby, was not a sprint either. Staples said some of the songs are years old, with the oldest around six or seven. He pointed to “Blackberry” as likely the oldest cut, with “Seven in the Morning” and “Running Man” also dated, while tracks like “TV Guide” came later. He followed the talk with a live-band set, the same setup he has been taking on the Cry Baby Tour.

Vince doesn’t put a number on what he clears, but he won’t play the rich-rapper bit either. “I’m not rich like that. I got some bread, but I’m not rich,” he told Rolling Stone. “I got less money than the anesthesiologist.” That lands next to his tour math: you front the bus, the band, the insurance, the venue costs, and if the tickets don’t move, you don’t make money. For him, the point isn’t flexing a net worth. It’s admitting the job only makes sense if you actually like doing it.

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