Monday, September 03, 2007

Tickets and ticketmatters

We can understand the concerns about people buying third-market tickets for a hitherto-unannounced Led Zep reunion tour, but it's interesting that the most worried man is Harvey Goldsmith:

In a statement, the rock promoter said: "There have been at least four events advertised which I suspect either don't exist or where no tickets are on sale or indeed dates finalised."

Now, is that the words of a man who is merely interested in the poor folk being fleeced, or are the words of a man inadvertently revealing that (a) Led Zeppelin are reuniting; (b) he's promoting the tour and (c) some of the tickets being sold are for actual gigs.

Which takes away some of the surprise and, rather than makes the third market seem unattractive, surely makes it more likely that punters will, well, take a punt on there being some sort of tickets at the end of it?

Meanwhile, the Guardian's money supplement gathered together some of those discontented with Prince's "all £31.21" ticket pricing. In particular, those who paid £235 for tickets to be "in the front ten rows", only to discover Ticketmaster then auctioning off the very front row. And then announcing another set of £250 seats "integrated into the stage".

Some people were understandably pissed off they'd forked out a small fortune for what they thought would be the best seats in the house, only to discover after they'd committed, there were better seats to be had after all. Others, that they'd paid thirty quid only to discover there were rich, braying types "integrated" into the stage.


3 comments:

Anonymous said...

What does "seats integrated into the stage" actually mean? Does anyone know? I quite like the image of people paying £250 for what they assume are the best seats in the house, only to find they'll actually be sitting onstage to take part in a bizarre mid-show interlude involving Prince, a strap-on and a selection of goats.

And some jam.

Ben.H said...

Yes, it means you get to spend the evening awkwardly perched on high stools around bar tables so close to the edge of the stage you can't actually see what's happening on it.

You may also get invited up to dance around stiffly during one of the songs, but not if you're "integrated" into the wrong end of the stage. So no doubt some of the 250 quid more-money-than-brains crowd are complaining about some other fat bastards who paid even more than they did to get up the right end.

Unknown said...

'integrated into the stage' seating isn't new... lots of venues used to do it when they reached capacity. All the photos of the Dylan 66 'Judas' gig have a bloke I know in the background of them, because he was 'integrated' into the stage...

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