The only objectively scummy thing Dave Grohl has done
This is a rant I typed out after the night 1 of Foo Fighters in LA after looking at not too full pit but only tidying up and posting now. Even since I had an email for assistance in selling an extra tickets locked in at above the current market value.
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How about instead of playing games with the pit tickets and pricing, just sell the tickets at the same price, get a full pit and happy fans?
There were major ticket scams and games at play with the Foo Fighters shows. To "fight scalping" they made the tickets non-transferable, if you can't go, the only way to get rid of the ticket is to put it back on the face value fan exchange via Ticketmaster. At first for this "sold out" show resale tickets would slowly trickle back out, with the tickets often being platinum priced in the $400 range for anything even slightly decent. It seemed the cheapest tickets were $125 with a smattering in the furthest reaches priced at $102 and those would also trickle out, usually in the rear or upper deck.
The day of the show rolls around and now there are loads of resale tickets, now competing with newly released $56.25 side view seats, plenty of prime seating selections at "normal" prices (around $219) with pit tickets released first at "face value" of 219.75 before dropping to $125.75. Ticketmaster always enforces price floors on resale tickets so you can't sell below face value. Since the fans who have either upgraded or now can't go are listing their tickets back up in massive numbers, most of those tickets are just sitting there capped at inflated face value but why would anyone click on the red dot when the late deciders can either get in for $56.25 or get in the pit for the very reasonable $125.95? Right now there are resale tickets priced at $219.75 right next to a $56.25 ticket.
In my days of ticket flipping Foo Fighters were usually money losers. Maybe in this case "fighting scalping" is more about the band not wanting to devalue their product when all the amateurs drawn in by the Taylor Swift hype are dumping tickets for $30, conditioning their fans to wait to buy when the next tour rolls around.
As of now brokers have workarounds. It was "non transferable" Pearl Jam ticket I scored for $26 in 2022, $22 for 2 Neil Young Greek Theatre tickets and biting the bullet with a bit more than I wanted to pay $32 Queen and Adam Lambert ticket. Maybe non-transfer fan exchange is also a scam to get the amateurs to think they are on to something hot without past data or a bit of natural caution to rely on.
Anyway if anyone needs tickets for the Sunday show with the always incredible Pretenders opening, you can now get them as low as $56.25 and while pit is currently priced at $219, they just might further reduce the price.
Unless it's Taylor Swift or anyone in the top few percentile, it pays to wait.
(BTW last night in town tend to a bit more demand so pit never went below $219.75 for Sunday).
im always looking for new shit in small venues. if you did not see the ff in 1995 when their first album came out, you missed out and they will never be able to recreate that. plus their 1995 sets were 40 minutes. perfect length. i cant imagine putting up with that shit for 3 hours.
ReplyDeleteTil the Taylor tribute that was the first and only time. It was also how I met my girlfriend. All her profile said was "If you like or love the Foo Fighters you should contact me." I thought I was being funny sending a semi trolling snarky message "I saw them in 1995" but the end result was me enduring them for almost 9 hours over a few days.
DeleteI would have ranked them third that night but then who would want to follow Hovercraft?
Objectively scumming? I would add having a baby outside his 20+ year marriage to the list of reprehensible things about Grohl. Considering his track record, I'm surprised he only has one.
DeleteI don't really know the kind of relationship / agreement he has with his wife. I was teasing my GF who was a little upset about it, how he broke his promise "whatever you don't get anyone pregnant or publicly embarrass me." I just assume she knew his past and knew what she was getting into when marrying a rock star. The benefits of the life he can give her outweighs the fact she will likely never be his one and only. The rest, I never really paid attention to him including the height of my ticketflipping days when I would skip the FF onsales in lieu of buying out the whole front row for the Oak Ridge Boys in Shreveport.
DeleteI never liked Dave Grohl he just drags on every song with his ranting and getting the crowd into it every Song no wonder tye shows are 3 hours long and besides his voice is irritating to listen to I like the studio stuff back in 95
DeleteHe should have let Krist join FF when they started. Dave and the band didn't want him there. Dave put the touring guitarist in FF but not Krist?
ReplyDeleteKrist played in Flipper. Krist wins.
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