I still have mine. They are like the examples in the bottom row, although mine are in better condition. Of course, by the time I got there no one was collecting tickets so I kept them.
It was a lot of money at the time. I had just graduated high school. My first temporary job was as a supermarket cashier, which was minimum wage, at that time about $1.30 an hour. My summer job was as a doorman on Park Avenue which paid the princely sum of $2.50 an hour.
The first concerts I went to were at the New York City Rock Festival at Singer Bowl in Flushing Meadows. The first show I saw featured The Who and the Doors. The second had the Chambers Brothers, Big Brother and the Holding Company (with Janis Joplin), and Jimi Hendrix. Tickets were $2.50.
I think it illustrates the hugely disproportionate inflation in the prices of all kinds of entertainment, from concerts to Broadway shows to baseball games since then. Back in 1969, I could go to a concert with multiple top acts for the cost of one or two hours of work. Today a ticket for the same level of acts will cost you the equivalent of one or two days (or more) of work.
That doesn’t seem very high at all - concerts today cost more, adjusted for inflation. I just looked up a yearly all weekend concernt, Carolina Rebellion, and this year a 3-day pass ran from $150-$300 depending on how far in advance you bought it, plus another $175-$275 if you wanted a camping space. The flat $165 for Woodstock tickets is a huge bargain compared to that. I looked up an evening concert near me and it was $40-$45 for tickets, which again makes the all day for $55 pretty reasonable.
The Who’s fee ($6,250) in the article doesn’t jive with the infamous contract insert from Live At Leeds–it stated they were to be paid $12,500 (half in advance, half after the performance). Considering the dynamic between promoters, managers and artists at the time, the lower amount is probably more believable.
I’d like to see a comparison between how much the performers were paid fifty years ago, adjusted for inflation, and today. I’m speculating that their payments have remained pretty steady over the years and it’s the various intermediaries who are making a larger share.
Like many people I consider inflation when looking at old dollar amounts. Which leads to a [tangent] Did you realize that it’s only people of our generation who had to do that? Value-of-money graphs available on the internet show that inflation on average was close to zero for most of American history.
It lends a different dimension to the idea of burying money or keeping it under the bed. Or even just saving money.
Also, $8 in 1855 money was much closer to 1965 money, than 1965 money is to 2018 money.
I saw Led Zeppelin in Sydney in 1972. A ticket cost $4 which, from memory, was less than it cost for my vinyl of Led Zeppelin IV a few months prior. I was probably earning about $80 a week.
I recall reading Robert Greenfield’s S.T.P.: A Journey Through America With The Rolling Stones, about their 1972 tour of the US. It was reported to be the highest grossing tour in history to that point. The Stones had already begun running their own tours on their prior US tour. At the conclusion Greenfield said each band member received, I believe, $10,000 as their share of the profit.
Wonder what weed sold for in 69? LOL