[Monty Python]Larceny! I paid $2.50![/Monty Python]
No joke, actually. I saw several shows at the New York Rock Festival at the Singer Bowl in Flushing Meadows in 1968.
In one show The Who were the opening act for The Doors, with Jim Morrison.
In another show I saw a triple bill of the Chambers Brothers, Big Brother and the Holding Company with Janis Joplin, and Jimi Hendrix.
I paid $2.50 for each of those concerts. 
Something tells me there’s an “alternate” way to get into the venue…
I would pay it to see Ticketmaster executives killed onstage.
Otherwise, I’m not into it enough to shell at that dough.
This cracks me up!
Every year in college, they would throw a free Beach Boys concert immediatly after one of the home football games, hoping people would stick around.
We never did.
1982: Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers, Santa Cruz Civic: $11.50
BubbaDog,
My daughter got us Tina tickets for my Mother’s Day present (May 11), but the event is on October 22nd (Sacramento, Arco Arena). Had no idea tix were that expensive! Prices on the Arco website range from $99.00 to $1692.00. Have no idea what my daughter paid.
Musta’ raised the girl right.
Personally, I think concert ticket prices have gotten way out of whack. I used to willingly pay a hundred bucks for a ticket back when I was rich, but not so much anymore, unless I really, really want to see them.
But, this makes me appreciate less famous bands who play for less money, yet put on a way great show. I just saw the King Brothers (warning, loud music) in a garage for free. They are certainly the most entertaining energetic Japanese punk rock garage band I’ve ever seen.
I hate you…
$1692? What am I getting thrown in for that kind of money? Lines of coke and at least a couple of hours’ sack time with Tina back at the hotel after, at least.
Do those fuckers ever get arrested, convicted and sent to prison? Normally I’m a soft-on-crime liberal, but I might not lose any sleep if we start locking scalpers up forever in lightless holes in the ground.
I just bought two tickets for the Judas Priest tour. They were $70 each, but with ticketmaster’s fees they were $170 bucks. There was actually a fee on top of the fee! I’ve stopped going to concerts for the most part because of all of the fees and crap. Then to top it off they had a $6 ‘sick’ insurance or something like that so if you can’t make the show they will give you your money back. They kept insisting that I buy it too. Fuckers.
Ha, Judas Priest was the opening act for my first concert. We all turned to each other when they were announced and said “who the fuck?” Rick Derringer was the second act. Led Zeppelin was the headliner at Day on the Green on 23 July 1977. I don’t remember what it cost but something like $6.99.
In many places it’s not a crime. And I have a hard time figuring out why it should be a crime; this is what the market will bear.
I go and see Queensryche and Bowling for Soup at the Orlando House of Blues every year.
$22.50 for each, last year. You people need to be more selective about your concert choices. I mean, really. I wouldn’t spend $182 to see my favorite act play in my living room.
(I know, I know, it’s your money, you can spend it on whatever you like, I probably spend equal amounts of money on other pointless extravagances. I’m just really happy that the bands I like don’t have complete douchebags for promoters. 
)
I do the same with Dashboard Confessional and Heart. Granted, Heart is more like $50 but worth it for being a room’s length away from them.
And I would spend $182 to see Heart play in my living room 
Could Ann Wilson fit in your living room?
Couldn’t help it.
I recently paid about $200 each for two (pretty frickin’ sweet) Radiohead tickets from an acquaintance of mine who’s in the, er, resale trade and owed me a favor. He informs me that he’d normally have gotten about $300-350 for them, and given what the people around us at the concert said they’d paid, I believe him.
Face value of the ticket: $51.
Personally, I’m waiting for the day that artists/venues start charging ticket prices in priced-to-market tiers. That way, the die-hard fans who are willing to pay out the nose will get the good seats they desire (with the profits going to the artist instead of some douchebag), and the people who just want to see the band can pay their $40 to sit in the back. It only makes sense, which I assume is the reason it has yet to be done.
To rub it in even further, I was at Woodstock. A ticket for all three days cost $27. With 32 groups performing, that works out to $0.84 per act (including The Who, Janis Joplin, The Grateful Dead, The Band, Jefferson Airplane, Santana, Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young, and Jimi Hendrix).
Sorry, as far as I’m concerned, $40 is still in Greedy Fortress of Fuckitude range. A few months ago I spent half that to see Booker T. Jones in a local club, and if any of these arena-rawk gods think they’re worth more than Booker T., they need to take a good, long look in the mirror.
Tom Waits, March 1981 - seat in the stalls (#BB20) £4.00
Curiously, I see that the ticket says £4.00 in advance, £4.50 on the day.
As I recall, it was sold out, so I don’t know if there were any tickets left by the day of the gig.
I think I remember feeling a bit hard done by because there wasn’t any support.
Good gig, though!