Lady Gaga to touch down at Xcel Energy Center on Aug. 21

As expected, she followed up her Super Bowl Half-Time performance with a tour announcement Monday morning.

February 6, 2017 at 1:01PM
Singer Lady Gaga performs during the halftime show of the NFL Super Bowl 51 football game between the New England Patriots and the Atlanta Falcons, Sunday, Feb. 5, 2017, in Houston. (AP Photo/Matt Slocum)
(Chris Riemenschneider/The Minnesota Star Tribune)
Lady Gaga lit up the Super Bowl Half-Time Show in Houston on Sunday. / Matt Slocum, Associated Press
Lady Gaga lit up the Super Bowl Half-Time Show in Houston on Sunday. / Matt Slocum, Associated Press (Associated Press/The Minnesota Star Tribune)

Not much in Lady Gaga's career is surprising anymore, including the fact that she announced an Aug. 21 date at Xcel Energy Center along with the rest of her 2017 tour on Monday morning -- just hours after landing a high-flying performance at Super Bowl LI in Houston.

Tickets to her St. Paul concert, which falls on a Monday, go on sale next Monday, Feb. 13, for $47.50-$252.50 via Ticketmaster and the arena box office. Minnesota will get to see the New York pop adventurer about three weeks into her Joanne World Tour, which begins Aug. 1 in Vancouver.

Just like Beyonce did last year, Gaga used the Super Bowl Half-Time Show as a 12-minute commercial for her summer tour. Unlike Bey, she avoided making any overt social or political statements that might have generated controversy, perhaps with an eye for selling tickets in red and blue states alike. As Forbes reported, the NFL doesn't actually pay its performers, it just covers production costs (which probably were quite sizable in Gaga's case given the bungee jump off the stadium's roof and synchronized drones). The payoff for the artists comes in the form of boosted album and ticket sales.

The New England Patriots weren't the ones to enjoy a big comeback on Sunday night. Gaga's Super Bowl LI performance capped off a career comeback that began with the October release of her fifth album, "Joanne," which earned strong reviews and includes the singles "Perfect Illusion" and "Million Reasons."

Her 2014 album, "ArtPop," stiffed commercially and critically, and her concert that year at Xcel Energy Center only drew about 11,000 fans – down from the 30,000 she played to over two sold-out nights at the St. Paul arena in 2010. In the interim, she won a Golden Globe for her acting in the FX series "American Horror Story" and issued a jazz duets album with Tony Bennett, "Cheek to Cheek."

about the writer

Chris Riemenschneider

Critic / Reporter

Chris Riemenschneider has been covering the Twin Cities music scene since 2001, long enough for Prince to shout him out during "Play That Funky Music (White Boy)." The St. Paul native authored the book "First Avenue: Minnesota's Mainroom" and previously worked as a music critic at the Austin American-Statesman in Texas.

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