Do you remember the Christmas Club?\u00c2\u00a0 That’s where you opened an account at the bank, and deposited fifty cents, maybe even a dollar or five, each week, so you’d have enough money for Christmas presents at the end of the year.\u00c2\u00a0 So you wouldn’t find yourself peering into store windows BROKE!<\/p>\n
Soon we’re gonna need Concert Clubs.\u00c2\u00a0 Savings accounts for concerts.\u00c2\u00a0 I mean who can afford to go more than once a year?<\/p>\n
Not many, that’s why we’ve got to put the ducats on sale LIGHT YEARS before the show takes place.<\/p>\n
Imagine this…\u00c2\u00a0 Buying a ticket to the new "Raiders Of The Lost Ark" movie next week.\u00c2\u00a0 Worse, going on TicketMaster to acquire it.\u00c2\u00a0 You want to see it this summer, don’t you?\u00c2\u00a0 You know what you’re doing the Friday night it opens…\u00c2\u00a0 Ah, what night DOES it open?\u00c2\u00a0 Memorial Day?\u00c2\u00a0 July 4th?\u00c2\u00a0 What if I get invited to the lake house?\u00c2\u00a0 What about my "Raiders" tickets!!<\/p>\n
Used to be that concert tickets were not much more expensive than movie tickets.\u00c2\u00a0 Now, they’re a monthly car payment.\u00c2\u00a0 Instead of live music being a regular habit, it’s like going on vacation, a once a year event, that you look forward to that doesn’t always deliver.\u00c2\u00a0 Wouldn’t it be better to go to multiple shows, and get immersed in the live experience?<\/p>\n
OF COURSE NOT!\u00c2\u00a0 BECAUSE I NEED MY FUCKING MONEY!<\/p>\n
LiveNation, AEG, the agents and promoters are going to make concertgoing such an exclusive privilege that the only ones able to go are themselves.\u00c2\u00a0 The regular public is not only being priced out, they’re being insulted.\u00c2\u00a0 And with fewer great acts to see, and the people with the bread wanting to be up close and personal, who the fuck is going to go anymore?<\/p>\n
It’s not only Celine Dion, putting her shows on sale over a YEAR in advance.\u00c2\u00a0 Springsteen sold next summer’s shows before winter had technically started.\u00c2\u00a0 Now, in today’s "New York Times", there’s an advertisement for James Taylor’s Tanglewood shows IN JULY!<\/p>\n
Now that’s July 4th weekend.\u00c2\u00a0 And people tend to plan ahead for it, if not THIS far ahead.\u00c2\u00a0 But the truth here is that JT and his posse want their MONEY!\u00c2\u00a0 They want to block out all competing events.\u00c2\u00a0 They want to get your bread before you blow it on dinner or a dress.\u00c2\u00a0 Before some other crusty act decides to tour this summer, or a new act arrives and steals JT’s thunder.<\/p>\n
They’re gonna put that money in the bank and reap all that interest income.\u00c2\u00a0 At the same time they’re raping the customer for ticket service charges.\u00c2\u00a0 They’re laughing, but the customer isn’t.\u00c2\u00a0 The customer has got other entertainment options.\u00c2\u00a0 And when the dinosaurs die off…THEN WHAT?\u00c2\u00a0 And, the dinosaurs don’t sell out like they used to.\u00c2\u00a0 Everybody’s seen ’em.\u00c2\u00a0 And been raped financially in the process.<\/p>\n
We need an edict.\u00c2\u00a0 That you can’t put tickets on sale more than two months out.\u00c2\u00a0 Certainly not more than three.\u00c2\u00a0 Otherwise, why not sell tickets for 2015?\u00c2\u00a0 Who cares if Eddie Van Halen falls off the wagon.\u00c2\u00a0 We’ve got everybody’s MONEY!<\/p>\n
You wonder why LiveNation’s stock tanked?\u00c2\u00a0 Someone finally ran the numbers, and noticed that there are no superstars in the pipeline.\u00c2\u00a0 Not that those running LiveNation really care, they plan to sell the operation and cash out anyway, they’re not in it for the long term.<\/p>\n
Is anybody in it for the long term?\u00c2\u00a0 Does anybody care about the fan?\u00c2\u00a0 Is money the only thing that matters?\u00c2\u00a0 Are we going to take every dollar from the table before everybody else in order to insure that WE’RE rich?<\/p>\n
Don’t tell me everybody’s fine with it.\u00c2\u00a0 They’re not.\u00c2\u00a0 TicketMaster is as hated as the major labels.\u00c2\u00a0 As stated above, concertgoing is no longer a casual event, but planned way in advance, like going to college.\u00c2\u00a0 Amazing that in the name of greed, no one’s looking to the future.<\/p>\n
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Do you remember the Christmas Club?\u00c2\u00a0 That’s where you opened an account at the bank, and deposited fifty cents, maybe even a dollar or five, each week, so you’d have enough money for Christmas presents at the end of the year.\u00c2\u00a0 So you wouldn’t find yourself peering into store windows BROKE! Soon we’re gonna need […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1100","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-music-business"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p96vPs-hK","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1100","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1100"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1100\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1100"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1100"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1100"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}