Gig Tickets - How much is too much

[4AssedMonkey]

The Mysterines next Feb in Leeds only £22.  Nice venue too (Wardrobe).  Bargain.

[Ben7amin_]

Just now, 4AssedMonkey said:

The Mysterines next Feb in Leeds only £22.  Nice venue too (Wardrobe).  Bargain.

 

Why are they never at Glastonbury. 

[Ben7amin_]

I paid £18 to see Dreamwife play last year and in a year that included Elton at Glastonbury. It was the best live music experience of 2023

[balti-pie]

£100 is my hard limit. Never paid more than that (well, not yet) and there’s barely any artists I’m desperate to see that would be charging that sort of $$$ anyways. Rammstein somewhere particularly cool and in the firezone might make me stretch to £120 perhaps 

 

edit; not much of a hard limit if I’m willing to break it for the right band 🤣

Edited July 18 by balti-pie

[Mardy]

I'm still pondering this. Would you pay more for a theatre ticket? For a cup final ticket? For a comparative experience? I dunno, a parachute jump? A meal at a MIchelin starred restaurant?

[Crazyfool01]

guess it depends obviously the costs increase as the size of the venue increases , but think my upper limit was for Coldplay at just over 100 quid .... Id have liked to have seen Dua but those tickets seemed out of range sadly . Also need to factor in Travel costs and how easy it is to get to the venue , for me at least . Seemingly in the middle of nowhere here with no / minimal live music here , although vivary park and the cricket ground have started doing some gigs the last few years .

[maelzoid]

I don't have a hard limit, but right now not a lot of spare cash, so Springsteen for 150-200 is not happening for me next week. But if I had the change, I'd probably go for it.

 

The whole Pearl Jam at Tottenham debacle left a pretty bitter taste in the mouth too.

 

But the article is right, the only way we reverse this is to not turn up. Unfortunately I think enough people are happy to normalise these kinds of prices that they are here to stay. Gigs are evolving from a fun night out to see a band, to an absolute 'event' with all the attendant extras and the price tag to match. 

[giantkatestacks]

1 hour ago, Mardy said:

I'm still pondering this. Would you pay more for a theatre ticket? For a cup final ticket? For a comparative experience? I dunno, a parachute jump? A meal at a MIchelin starred restaurant?

I think this is the interesting question - we had tickets for a sporting event this week and put them up for sale and got refunds for the accommodation costs as we just couldnt justify it. Mainly because we had spunked x amount on BST gold circle tickets. I looked at the Paris olympics tickets and that was a hard no as well.

[Padjeq]

I was interviewed by the BBC about this last week. Ostensibly for an article but I had to agree to be interviewed by radio and on tv too if it gains traction.

 

With Billie Eilish, it's a lot of factors. Price is one. Another is putting everything on sale at once - although fair play to her. How many of us have scrambled for some sunday night show only to be hit with a newly announced saturday night special 2 hours after that first gig sells out?

[gigpusher]

Completely agree with @Mardyin that it's not easy to set a hard limit because not everything is the same so I do of course set limits but those limits are variable.

 

For example I go to the theatre as well. I am happy to pay more money for a big show with a big cast and big sets than I am willing to pay for some podcaster who is doing a live show and just needs a chair and a microphone. I appreciate that everyone involved in the process needs to make a living so I would be likely to set different limits for those things.

 

There is also a range of prices for stadium and arena shows. Everyone made such a fuss about the Taylor Swift tickets but I got 2 for £177. I could at least see where that money was being spent. It's a big incredible show. There are some rock bands charging not far off the same price without anywhere near the same level of show being provided.

 

I personally make the big price shows my exception rather than the rule and usually have a limit of about £35 per ticket unless it is something special but that's just because it means I can go to more gigs and support the more grassroots artists and venues. Use them or lose them as they say.

 

I do think there are a few changes I would love to make to gig ticketing and the main one would be transparency of pricing. Advertise the concert and show up front the pricing around the stadium in advance so people can make a choice without feeling under pressure and get dynamic pricing in the bin. The costs for events have gone up hugely as well and if it was practical it would be nice if there were priority (and cheaper) tickets for those who support the artists in other ways like buying physical music or merchandise.

[4AssedMonkey]

3 hours ago, Mardy said:

I'm still pondering this. Would you pay more for a theatre ticket? For a cup final ticket? For a comparative experience? I dunno, a parachute jump? A meal at a Michelin starred restaurant?

 

Never really thought of it that way but you have a valid point.  I love food/cooking and did pay £140 per head for a 7 course tasting menu (with drink pairings) at a Michelin star restaurant once.  Really enjoyed the experience, but saw it very much as a one-off indulgence for an anniversary.  Live music is however one of my everyday "hobbies" and has been for over 30 years so I can't really draw a comparison.

 

In my head, spending upwards of £100 to see "an act" is hard to justify.  I don't care for backing dancers, slick choreography, costume changes, loads of pyro/light shows etc. and find arenas and stadiums to have poor sound, terrible facilities, expensive bars with watered down sh*t beer and an awful atmosphere.  If I was to spend that kind of money and endure that sort of venue it would need to be for an act I have never seen and an opportunity I just can't miss.  There aren't many of those.

[goldfishboy]

personally i wouldn't go over £40 unless it was an absolute bucket list gig and even then i would have to think long and hard

[Skip997]

Paying £100 plus to see a gig is mad.

 

Paying more than £20 to eat is absolute insanity 

[balti-pie]

12 minutes ago, Skip997 said:

Paying £100 plus to see a gig is mad.

 

Paying more than £20 to eat is absolute insanity 

 

you've got a point with the first bit, but the second bit is genuinely insane. If you're not a bit of a gourmand then hey fair enough, but twenty quid is bugger all 😄 if you're a seafood nob like me then twenty quid would be spent on a couple of interesting starters. (The Company Shed in Mersea, Essex is my favourite seafood place i think, and thats really reasonable, but youre still looking at north of £30 at least - at least!) 

[Suprefan]

6 hours ago, FloopFiller said:

Keep seeing this story doing the rounds, and I’ve gotta ask, where are they getting this £250 lowest price tag from?! The lowest price for her O2 shows was around £80, which have sold out, and the top prices were around £180, which also look to have mostly sold out (going from seetickets). In fact, most of the dates seem to have sold out, so I’ve gotta imagine this inflated price tag they’re quoting has come from somewhere like Ticketmaster after they’ve been up to their old tricks, or some kind of VIP package that is still on sale?

 

The tickets for her shows were expensive, and they seemed to take longer than you’d expect to sell, but they weren’t that expensive, and for the most part, they do seem to have sold…

 

everyones falling for the clickbait because they think the shows arent selling well when theyre 90% sold out with a year before they happen. People also fail to realize the shows are in the round 360. So theres more tickets to sell and youre not getting a bad view anywhere unlike some other person selling tix behind the stage.

 

 

The artist is not allowing resale or anything. Theyre also charging fair market value for their tickets which isnt being noticed either. 
 

You know when tickets have a lower face value to begin with and then they hit resale for double or triple the cost? Billie got ahead of that by doing this because of restriction. If a Standing ticket was £100, the concert sells out and via resale theyre £250 you look at that and call the resellers greedy and all the names under the sun. If Billie priced those standing tickets  now at £250 and they sold without issue,  and no resale is allowed then thats bad?  
 

people hate that somebody is putting the correct value on something because they want the lower price point instead. So the tickets are being sold at what they might fetch via resale sites just from the start and apparently its offensive. EVEN THOUGH there would be people who would pay the resale price because they knew the initial face value was much lower and they got to dictate what they were willing to pay. But oh no, lets not start at the ceiling right. 

[Suprefan]

1 hour ago, Skip997 said:

Paying £100 plus to see a gig is mad.

 

Paying more than £20 to eat is absolute insanity 

 

: Laughs in American : 

 

( I will never not keep saying this for the gig thing )

[BlueDaze]

4 hours ago, Mardy said:

I'm still pondering this. Would you pay more for a theatre ticket? For a cup final ticket? For a comparative experience? I dunno, a parachute jump? A meal at a MIchelin starred restaurant?

good point that does indeed make you ponder.... (I never have, or will, pay £100 to see a stadium 'gig/show')

But... the things you talk about are more exclusive/intimate... Taylor Swift, Elton, Stones or whoever are playing 4 Cup Finals a week..

If they played a small (some say intimate) venue then the price would seem more justified.*

 

*i am a bit of a grumpy old bloke and wouldnt pay £100 to see TS play my kitchen tbf

If Portishead played Cambridge Junction, i would bite your hand off though 

 

[duke88]

I paid £170 for brilliant seats at Taylor Swift, but I wouldn’t go anywhere near that for anyone else. I generally won’t go above £80.

[charlierc]

3 hours ago, Suprefan said:

 

: Laughs in American : 

 

( I will never not keep saying this for the gig thing )

Imagine how annoyed you'd be to have forked out $300+ for Foo Fighters in New York last night on ticket alone only for a thunderstorm to stop the gig halfway through.

[sedra]

In line with everything else prices have gone up in all venues- post pandemic effect plus hike in energy, insurance, security, wages etc. from small venues to big arenas/stadiums. 
Plus the extra costs generated by promoters and ticket agents. Artists on tour have also increased travel and wages costs. That’s why festivals can be good value for money for customers but single gigs can end being expensive- plus any travel, accommodation on top of tickets. This year I paid £25 to see The Lottery Winners at the Cheese and Grain- was able to stay at a friends house and extra cost was petrol. I also saw Taylor Swift in Edinburgh which cost £172 for front standing tickets, £220 for 2 nights in hotel ( my share of a triple room!!) and £300 for flights, plus at least another £100 for other expenses. So yes ridiculously expensive overall. And a complete one off. But figure as I volunteered at Glastonbury this year I can offset the costs of TS a bit. And I’m not going on holiday this year. 
Next year have tickets for Frank Turner at Ally Pally - show 3000 for £49 which is reasonable, £56 for hotel plus train tickets so about average cost overall. Locally ( Bournemouth) our largest venue charges anywhere from £45 to well  over £100. Bob Dylan prices are mainly over £100. Our local O2 academy in walking distance charges anything from £30- £60 +- Kasabian next week are £48. 
Always worth getting last minute tickets fan to fan for face value or less though for any gig if you really want to go to something ( avoiding scammers of course) 

Both bands and smaller venues need to make a living so rare to find anything under £20 these days.