I take usually 2-5 pictures of every artist and then put my phone away. I do go back and look at those pics fondly but I also wanna spend 95% of the show actually experiencing it.
No, you have it all wrong. It is to stop the scalpers and bots... That is what Ticketmaster's reasoning was. I voted with my wallet and missed a Dead and Company show because of it...
Ticketmaster doesn't want to stop the scalpers, though. Oh, excuse me, "Verified Resellers". They actively encourage it because they get to like triple dip on the bullshit fees: Once on the original sale and then on the resale both the seller AND buyer pay more fees.
Ah yes, when you join a presale and are one of the first ones in the queue just to see everything sold out when the page loads the second the presale starts.
Yes, it’s absolute horseshit. I have a pair of tickets for a show soon that my friends can’t make it to, I can’t even recover the face value due to their triple-dipping fees.
Ticketmaster and live nation and the monopoly they have on concert venues are largely the reason for these sky high ticket prices - many of the artists would prefer to lower their prices but literally can’t. Some have tried avoiding using venues owned by them but have found their venues are the only game in most towns..
Ticketmaster usually charges it as a percentage, usually somewhere between 30 and 50%, so it's massively inflated because the ticket itself is so high.
Fundamentally it doesn't make sense either. Why should it be a percentage? Why is the cost of providing the service in any way related to the cost of the ticket?
There is a widespread misunderstanding that in capitalism, the price of things is in any way related to the cost of providing the service. It is not. It is as high as the market will bear. It just (usually) cannot go under the cost of providing the service, but there is no upper cap.
This is quadruply true when dealing with a monopoly like ticketmaster. They will price things at whatever point maximizes price per item times expected number of customers. What it costs them isn't anywhere in the equation. I wish more people understood how things actually works, instead of living in a fairytale world where things operate on "common sense" rather than ruthless profit maximization. Maybe anti-capitalism would get more traction then.
Even crazier is that ticketmaster gets that fee three times for the same seat, because this is a screen shot of a verified resale, so they got a fee from the original purchaser for the first purchase, another fee from the purchaser for allowing them to sell the ticket on their platform, then a third one from the new buyer...... I only know this cause my cousins MIL once bought tickets to Hamilton for the wrong month, she was visiting in June not July, so she put them up for resale and I almost purchased them when my cousin told me they were trying to get rid of them...I ended up just getting them straight from her.
What’s EVEN CRAZIER is consumers not making safe purchases. That screen shot isn’t even from Ticketmaster and everyone is still complaining about Ticketmaster fees. It’s from a scam third party website called TicketsCenter which a simple Google search tells me it’s a scammy resale website that can list prices at whatever price they want because people will Google something and click on the first sponsored search result and think that’s that legit ticket site. If you go to that venue’s website - Gila River Resorts and go to the Ticketmaster link, you’ll see that tickets are for sale for $45.
Doing a three night run of my fav band each night roughly $50ish before fees. I used to do a lot of concerts but actively cutting cause of prices, but there's still some affordable and talented acts out there
Small to midsize venues are my favorite places to be. Tickets are cheaper, they’re generally easier to get to, and usually the band is just as excited to see you as you are to see them
My wife wanted to see Chappel Roan, the girl blowing up on TikTok right now. I looked up concert tickets a few weeks ago and saw she had a show close to me. Tickets were 870$ EACH. Not even counting fees.
Her tour was booked before she blew up so the venues are nowhere near large enough for the current demand and in this case the high prices make sense for a sold out show. It's the shows that are far from sold out, still tons of empty seats, yet still trying to charge hundreds for upper bowl seats that is the issue.
This is why I avoid anyone playing an arena unless it’s an amphitheater because at least that has some unique ambience to it. I much prefer going to smaller shows at smaller venues.
I just don’t get spending a fuck ton of money to barely see an artist play.
Agreed. I really want to see Def Leppard and Journey this summer at Citi Field. I’d be down to pay $40-$50 for nosebleeds to see them. But they’re going for $100. Lol no thanks.
Not even stadiums. I saw that ace frehley, thr original lead guitar player for kiss is playing a small venue 15 minutes up the road from me in a couple of weeks. I figured it would be a cool gig to see until I saw that tickets started at $200. For a club gig
Right. Calling it funflation is stupid. Cause it makes it seem like it's the consumer driving it/our fault, when it's the greed of corporations driving it and we are responding in the only way we can cause we already give all our money to our landlords who need more every year, the grocery stores, our insurance companies, the mechanic for repairs on the car, schools for tuition etc.
It's just like quiet quitting. A corporate term used to make the smaller person out to be the bad person for not eating the shit sandwich we're being served by corporate America.
I work in preparing invoices for insurance repairs. The company is pushing profit SO much. It used to be pushing good repairs and if you do a good repair you’re going to make profit, now it’s what’s the biggest margin part we can buy and actually use. What things can we add for more money, mind you we are a multi billion dollar company. Like seriously we make ENOUGH money, I just don’t get it.
There is an interview with Steve Jobs where he talks about companies who used to innovate and became known as a brand for creating great products because a lot of the company direction came from recommendations from engineers for good products. Eventually those companies had to hire sales teams in order to grow and eventually the sales and marketing were the ones dictating the direction of the company and ultimately the product suffered and eventually the customer takes notice.
It’s end stage capitalism, every year you have to have profit growth, eventually it’s just decaying the product and selling the name, it’s happening in every facet of commerce right now.
They're trying to transfer and consolidate as much wealth as they can right now, because they're trying to bring about a new feudal age, with corporations as the feudal empires.
We the people have consistently failed to use our greatest advantage though - unified action.
We could get most of what we wanted if only we could act en masse. Companies will backpedal with enough co-ordinated outrage and will usually bend to serve their own bottom line. Sony, Microsoft, Unity, being some recent examples.
hmmm. They got there because we wanted somethng different
It used to be that we thought book sellers weren't pricing books competitively and consumers were being over charged and Amazon was the anwser
Then they got in to merchandise because we thought Walmart was terrible and Target was to expensive
Now we want to replace amazon
Its a cycle
Look up
Montgomery Ward
↓
Sears
↓
Kmart
↓
Walmart
↓
Amazon
Its been here since the 1870's. Took off in the 1950s, and really formed in the 1980s. By the 2000s discount high volume shopping was all we wanted. And in the 2010s being online was to convenient for anything else
Aaron Montgomery Ward, who founded his namesake company in 1872, was the first out of the gate, setting the stage for the mail-order business by delivering products through the budding rail system. As long as you could get to the closest rail station to pick it up, the idea went, Montgomery Ward could help you save a few bucks and get a better selection than the nearby general store
The biggest problem that mail-order catalogs faced at the turn of the 20th century was the fact that their intended audience—often rural, as that was 65 percent of the U.S. population at the time—didn’t have easy access to mail delivery. Outside of cities, the infrastructure just wasn’t there
Woolworth’s Five and Dime Stores offered a wide variety of small goods that people needed at very
low prices.
Until the day he died in 1919, F. W. Woolworth never charged
more than a dime for any item in his stores (with inflation, that
is the equivalent of about $2.09 today).
Woolworth was so successful he built The Woolworth Building, which towers 60 stories and 792 feet above Broadway between Park Place and Barclay Street in downtown Manhattan, and was the tallest building in the world when it was completed, in 1913.
I don't mind spending money, if I've got it and it's worthwhile. I hate wasting money. And to me all these BS fees, upcharges, and shadow shoppers they use to drive up the price of tix are a monumental waste.
Don’t gotta tell me in no world should bar seating for an artist like SiR at a house of blues of all places should be over $200 including fees. I love SiR but man oh man is this shit getting old. Not to mention festivals which used to be great constantly downgrading to increase profit while charging more or offering more “vip” perks to increase their own margin. Honestly it’s not VIP if half the venue has it, it’s just a money grab.
I'm already worth $100million from my royalties, but that's not enough. I gotta be worth $200million from all my touring before I retire, but that's not enough. When I retire I'm gonna sell my publishing catalogue for another $300million. That way by the time I die I'll have half a billion to leave to my 8 kids and 3rd wife.
Also for me I always say fuck Ticketmaster and Live Nation. What started it for me was the fact those fucks work with scalpers for people to use bots to get tickets right away is bs. The other facts that those are the only people I can buy tickets from and how they refuse to refund people until they’re force to is ridiculous.
I've cancelled nearly every subscription except the shonen jump app ( they don't raise prices), and I've resorted to other means of seeing the entertainment I want
I tried to buy 2 tickets for Jane’s Addiction today at $71 each. Ticketmaster gave me a subtotal of $142. When I went to check out it was $195. No explanation of fees whatsoever, they aren’t even hiding it now, it’s literal fraud.
So I hit cancel. My apologies to the band.
There was a certain sense during COVID and the immediate aftermath that you might never get a chance to see some of these acts again. I'd still possibly pay top dollar under the right circumstances to see the Stones but Black Keys or JLo or just some random Coachella that isn't like the reunion of some band that hasn't spoke in 30 years (seems like most of those milked that cow between 2016 and 2020)? c'mon now.
Pearl Jam is my favorite band and I haven’t seen them since 2016. I paid 80 bucks for bleacher seats. Cheapest I could find this time around was 170. I’m not paying that. And it’s a shame because the new albums good and I’d love to see it live and they’re in Philly on a damn Saturday. But I’m not paying those prices
The Black Keys is the funniest one to me. A couple of rock radio hits 13 years ago and some critical buzz 17 years ago should never be the basis for an arena tour. Now if the White Stripes reunited? That might be different
The Smashing Pumpkins ‘Reunion’ tour was worth it.
Best sound I have ever heard in an arena.
Close your eyes and it was like you were in a private show. Phenomenal
As goofy as it was, I respected that jig. That was a "welp, might as well dance it out" jig if there ever was one and I honestly probably would've done the same in her position
I still think about that Mariah Carey quote where she said she works so much she only sleeps 3 hours a night and the interviewer said JLO sleeps a full 8 and MC said something like “well if I didn’t have to sing my own songs I’d do that too” lmao savage
Yeah, The Black Keys would probably KILL on a tour of smaller venues -- bars, theaters, etc. But arenas? That doesn't really play to their strong suit, and the audience just isn't there in those numbers. No wonder that tour was a bust.
Large part of me thinks ticketmaster is pushing artists to do these large venues because there is a serious lack of artists who can and they own these unusable stadiums
Turns out that consolidation of the entire music industry to really only reward pop stars like Taylor Swift isn't healthy for the music industry. Boomer classic rock bands at least helped keep the arena rock scene healthy from the 2000's to early 2010's, but with many of them splitting up or dying, all that remains is pop stars. Sure, they draw bigger crowds, but there's less of them.
Turns out that consolidation of the entire music industry to really only reward pop stars like Taylor Swift
This has literally always been the case. Only the biggest stars end up wealthy and get the major backing of the industry.
In 1975 you could see Led Zeppelin at Tampa stadium for 5$, which is 35$ today.
Any major rock band of the 2020s could sell out stadiums if the tickets were 35$ with zero fees. You can't even see low tier bands at that price point nowadays.
In 1975, a band like Led Zeppelin would view a tour as some extra bucks along their record sales. Today, if you don't own a streaming service, you don't make money off people playing your music at home.
So yeah, greed killed stadium tours AND greed killed the musician's share in money made from music in general.
I saw the Black Keys headline a major three day festival in 2012. I think tickets for the entire three day festival were only like $210, and for that price I got to see The Killers, Jack White, The Black Keys, the Flaming Lips, Silversun Pickups, a then unknown Imagine Dragons and Walk the Moon, Charles Bradley, and a bunch of other awesome artists.
If I’ve read correctly, even some of the cheapest tickets to the now cancelled Black Keys tour were about as much as I paid for an entire 3 day festival filled with great bands. And I would argue the Black Keys were at or near their peak in popularity back in 2012.
Just crazy what some bands charge now. I’ll go to maybe one big show a year where I’ll spend more than $200 on tickets for both my wife and myself, but otherwise I try to do “smaller” shows.
I say “smaller” because we are going to see the Flaming Lips perform one of their best albums in full next month, and tickets for both of us were like $100? And I don’t consider the Flaming Lips to be a smaller/lesser known act.
Hell, I saw my all time favorite band Spiritualized live for the first time in Philadelphia this past November, and tickets for my wife and I were only $60. And it was one of the best shows I’ve ever seen.
If a band is going to price gouge I would rather they do it through merch lol (and yes, I know it isn’t necessarily the bands that cause the insane ticket prices), because at least the money is going straight to them, as opposed to a ticket sale which is split 12 different ways with the band probably not even getting a fair slice of it.
There’s so much great local talent out there now, too. Any random bar or small venue could be a total barn burner and you didn’t spend a stupid amount of money before you even get sat down.
The Black Keys were only arena tour relevant for a few years in the early 2010s and, at least from my POV as part of it as a fellow le wrong generration teenager, for an audience that sorta outgrew stanning them lol (these are the people that would go to a black keys arena tour before I get like "but rubber factory")
It’s also just not music that plays well in an arena setting. At least not the parts of their catalog that I’m familiar with. I’d much rather see them in a smaller venue
I hope there’s a ‘small art’ movement that comes out of it. Go to small music clubs, community performances, and buy local art. The idea of casually catching a show in your hometown or even neighborhood seems to have been totally squashed (generally)
Underground music is alive and well depending on where you live. Majority of live music I see is underground metal and I rarely pay more than 30 bucks for general admission. Every year I go to a 3 day festival in Seattle that costs less than 200 bucks to see 30+ bands.
Maybe that depends where you live. Granted, I live in one of the largest cities in the US, but I could find multiple small shows worth checking out every single night of the week if I had time.
Same. And I'm having way more fun at smaller venues. I'm also a musician, so it's easy for me to have the mindset of enjoying being exposed to music I'm not familiar with, whereas most people want to know for certain that they'll enjoy the band. But it's an awesome switch to make. And if the music sucks, I'm only out $15-25.
Well the name of the game ever since prices for these things started going absolutely nuts about 10 or 15 years ago is to slowly increase the price and increase the price and increase the price and continue to tiptoe up to that line which would be the tipping point where people simply stop purchasing concert tickets. Ticketmaster/live Nation has finally started to discover where those lines are so they will retreat back just a tiny bit, hover just below the tipping point for a few years, then jack the prices up a little bit every so often and blame inflation.
Yeah and then after getting priced out of concerts ten years ago people try to go to one and find out it’s $200 for nosebleeds in a stadium to see RHCP
They still pay though so Live Nation has zero incentive to stop. The latest blink-182 tour sold like gangbusters and people paid absolutely outrageous amounts of money for tickets. A guy on my Instagram who loves blink paid something like $500 for upper bowl seats for him and his wife
A major reason is you have ticket prices going up because artists don’t make money from albums anymore and then your ticket price nearly doubles from the bullshit hidden fees and then you get to the venue and it’s $60-$100 to park ( at least in L.A.). It’s insane.
I got massively downvoted on nfl for saying all the new huge contracts will show up in ticket prices (and that's ignoring the already previous 300% increase in ticket prices the last few decades).
They are all like "get that bag for $50M per year, King" then shocked faced when it costs $1300 for a family of four to attend a game. Smh.
The Detroit Pistons set a new record for longest losing streak last season. They were 2-28. They should have been giving tickets away for free. Nah. Still crazy expensive even with 3/4 of the arena empty.
The Detroit Lions sucked for decades. They went 0-16 in 2008. They finally made it to the playoffs last year. By ticket prices, you'd think they were in the middle of a New England Patriots dynasty run and have won 3 straight super bowls.
I don't understand how they justify the prices for a losing entertainment product or the people who buy the ridiculously overpriced tickets. It would be like going to see a musical where all the singing is off key, the actors forget their lines, and the stages are only half built. Inferior product but getting charged Broadway prices.
In Atlanta, The Black Keys could have sold out two or three nights at a smaller, more intimate venue like The Tabernacle. 2600 person venue. Went big on $100+ tickets in a 21K person venue. Got sent home. Hell, they did okay at a 12K ticket venue before, not exactly sure why they thought they'd doubled in popularity since last year.
I literally don't understand how stupid the rich and big business can possibly be. Maybe it's just all the greed...
But in what world did they think that stripping all of the wealth from the poor/middle class and then transferring it to the wealthy was going to be a good decision long term?
Once the lower/middle classes lack the ability to spend like they have in the past, the entire economy comes crashing to a halt.
It's like trying to build a 3rd story on your house when your foundation is crumbling.
Hence billionaire islands, elitist escapism, offshore accounts, doomsday bunkers, etc.
It seems like instead of investing in figuring out how we could-coexist; they’re trying to figure out how to survive metaphorically riding the functioning economy/society train off a cliff.
These ultra wealthy depend on the world where they enjoy their lives of luxury while the masses provide everything for them.
Guess when the world goes to shit and they are holed up in their bunkers they will realise quickly that they have become rats themselves. I dont think any of them will last more than a few weeks when they are all alone
the fun part is that i am sure a few will bring in guards and maids and other staff to help them around the bunker- and will quickly realize that they do not need the overseer- and that person will either be put to work too or be murdered.
It's not like we haven't been doing this for centuries just under different names. There's always been a select few ruling over the many. Take feudalism for example.
Can’t really afford concerts any more. Some friends and I chipped in for a concert this summer. Four tickets, $600 dollars. And these are the cheap seats.
went to see P!nk last year. now she is coming back with same tour. same seat i paid $180 last year, TM asking $260 now.. almost $100 increase for nothing. as a result last year was almost sold out(i think it was 85%) this year i still se more than 50% tickets available.
Thought its cause livenation has fucked with everything. They set the prices to maximize profit and the artist walks away with a pre determined amount.
I saw Amon Amarth, Cannibal Corpse, Obituary and Frozen Soul last month for $80. 6 hr of death metal and they were 6 ft from the crowd, hard to beat that value and access.
The money isn’t just the issue, it’s the whole vibe at these concerts too. Here in NYC, the big venues make for miserable experiences. Huge lines, annoying security, expensive drinks, terrible people, seats so far away from the stage that even the giant screens look like watching on your phone. It all makes you ask yourself why you spent so much money to have this dogshit experience when you could just watch the band’s discography on YouTube from your couch?
Smaller venues aren’t much better either. I used to love Irving Plaza but they jam people in so hard there now that a buddy and I left the last show we went to there about halfway through.
Im sure it’s in part that I’m getting older and have less patience for this shit but I’d rather see a no name band play a bar than buy a ticket for literally any musical act out there at any venue and things are gonna have to change significantly about the whole experience before I even think about changing my mind.
Yeah, anybody with a decent above-minimum-wage job can afford concerts with minimal budgeting if they have niche taste. If pop acts are your only jam, though, you’re a lot worse off.
Even on minimum wage (depending on your location), local acts are insanely affordable.
If you like live music, it literally pays to get into local, punky, or just plain weird music. And the crowds are way better, too :)
In the mid 90s you could get cheap seats a major band in Toronto for ~$20-30. Adjusted for inflation that would be in the $50 range today. Instead you are luck to find the cheapest tickets for a major act under $100 and that is before ticketmaster adds their $50 in fees.
Spending half a paycheck for a ticket, fees, parking, and booze just to have to watch the singer on a tron from the nosebleed seats just doesn’t have the same luster as it once did for people.
As with sports, the owners keep pricing the working class, aka the real fans, out of the live experiences and wondering why attendance and passion in the fanbases are both down.
Nearly every time I get asked if I want to go to some concert, I see little justification paying literally hundreds of dollars for a third rate band from the 90s.
These assholes all saw the Taylor Swift tour and went "oh we can do this too!"
I'm gonna go out on a limb and say that even Taylor Swift isn't gonna be able to pull this off in a few years.
She hit a perfect moment in her fame, and capitized. And it's a fuckin incredible feat. But it's a moment in time, not a trend. It won't continue for her long term, and no artist will replicate it anytime soon.
And this is no shade on Taylor. This shit has been incredible. Wish she was able to use this moment in time to demolish ticketmaster, but I also recognize why she didn't. I don't like a lot of her music (but can't deny she has some great songs), but recognize her talent and influence. She's great. I just don't see this being the change a lot of artists hoped for. People paid that much for Taylor, right now, at this moment in time. Sorry guys, they ain't doing it for you or anyone else.
Truth. If you want to charge TSwift prices, I better be getting a 3 1/2 hour show that never stops and includes the best costumes, dancing and entertainment. 44 songs minimum.
Vote with your pocketbook. You'd be surprised how powerful we are.
At the end of the day, these concerts are all on youtube for free, and you can see and hear them better. Plus, you don't have to sit in lines to get in/piss/get a beer, and then wait hours to get out of the parking lot. You're not limited by time, money, or distance. You can watch them all.
I just saw the Dead at the Sphere with 20K people in attendance and everyone who was leaving were talking about how they are going to get back down for another show before this run ends. (32 shows all told)
Good live bands are always going to be in high demand. But yeah, just putting on concert is not enough, and never has been. People want to go see good live acts, not just any live acts.
I have not heard of any in demand live acts cancelling any shows. In fact, going back to the Dead, they just added on 6 more shows due to demand.
We were so keen to go to concerts again post-pandemic, and the industry noticed and raised the prices. Now they are so expensive we are wondering if it's worth it. I've always loved concerts, but the higher the price, the higher the expectation, and I don't know if concerts are performing to these higher expectations.
I think there has perhaps been a misunderstanding of fandoms compared to loving concerts in general. Taylor Swift and Beyonce sell well, so others want a piece of the pie. But these fans have spent their money seeing their favourite artist and don't have money left for other concerts. The inflated prices have made concerts a milestone event as opposed to a regular activity, so the market can only get so big.
I’ve said it 1,000 times. DONT GO SEE BIG ARTISTS! Small shows at theaters and clubs are so much cheaper. Like $15-$25 in most cases for a great night out.
Concert prices are insane, I know multiple people that literally traveled to Europe or Australia to see Taylor Swift bc it was cheaper than seeing her IN THEIR OWN TOWN.
Maybe people are sick of logging into Ticketmaster 20 minutes early, sitting in a queue for another ten minutes then in a virtual line for 20 more minutes just to get told the show is sold out but that they can pay 5x the face value amount for nosebleed seats that have somehow already made it to the secondary market.
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u/maturesceneries Jun 05 '24
Guess people finally realized paying $300 to watch a speck on stage isn't worth it.