I love concerts. I hate getting tickets. Its the most unnecessary source of stress ever. they can turn the youngest, most innocent hannah montana fans into jaded, unscrupulous monsters. the stakes are soooo high, often ending up with nooooo tickets. Even if you get tickets, unless you're getting eyeGO tickets your gonna have nooooooo money left. its usually a lose/lose there. If the Centre in the Square can get away with $5 tickets to students, why do other places constantly charge $100+ for decent seats (and don't even get me started on food prices)?? I've been to quite a few concerts in all distances from stage, major locations and price ranges, and front row eyeGO tickets for $5 trump $50 nosebleed tickets at the ACC for comparable acts (in quality, not commercial success).
I just don't get it. I think most people in the region have probably heard something about city counselors getting free Elton John tickets for the Aud, when they were sold out and limited to just about everyone else? Can you really blame the counselors? well yes, because the Aud is publicly funded (i believe), but not as fans. I'm not an Elton John fan, but lets say someone offered me free tickets to my favourite act. I'd probably yell something like "ZEPPELIN RULES!!!", grab em and run. How could I say no??
The problem isn't so much the principal of them getting free tickets, its that they had a sure way of getting tickets when everyone else had to duke it out in lines and (the worst) on ticketmaster websites. Its a dog-eat-dog world when it comes to concerts. Now even the good ol' fashioned street scalpers have to compete with eBay scalpers. And the eBay scalpers compete with eachother in an ever-escalating arms race of Spice Girls Reunion front row tickets and Neil Young Massey Hall balcony seats. How can the average fan compete when big name acts routinely sell out in under ten minutes when the box office first opens? When my stepbrother's stepmom bought tickets in line at the Sunrise Conestoga Mall ticketmaster, she bought four for us... by the time the guy behind her was up, all the tickets were gone. The only reason I got to see David Gilmour in Massey Hall (guitarist of Pink Floyd) was because my stepdad happened to know Gilmour's old tour manager. its getting a little extreme.
Actually, its getting out of control. Concerts are great. Tickets are despicable, from the first time you learn the date the box office opens until they're scanned at the door of the venue. At the end of the day, almost everybody but the fans wins. Fans are a captive market, and venues and acts routinely take advantage of their unconditional love of music. High prices and low availability empty their wallets, or keep out poor fans altogether. I hope more venues and acts adopt programs like the eyeGO program, for the sake of fans who keep paying through the nose for the art they love. Until then, the shows must go on.