Alter Bridge 'Walk the Sky' spring US tour 2020

[anguyen92]

Goes to buy Seattle tickets... Lives within the area that it says can buy online... website then says I'm out of the catchment area...

It's such a stupid policy to put into place. I get it, I think. Promoters want local people to come to the shows and support music and local venues and all, but others, like me, probably want to go to this show in addition to wanting to go to travel and explore Seattle as well.

[The Dissident]

Seeing as it is the closest they are coming to me and it still is a 3 hour drive I think the policy is a pain especially since it specifically says BC as an area that can buy tickets...

[jailman]

very cool looking poster.

Whats with the huge bird in the background though?

Blackbird and Crows on a Wire are from past albums.

[anguyen92]

Well, birds still play a huge role in the album cover of Walk the Sky with a swarm of them carrying a lady in red over water.

[One Drew Remains]

Really hope that's a shirt. Next leg isn't anywhere near me, but I'd buy that anyway. Very cool.

[anguyen92]

Well. I called in earlier this afternoon to buy my ticket for the Seattle show. Cost me $45.75 which is what I would have paid online at Ticketmaster anyway. Got a email receipt. They told me to pick it up at the venue the day of the show and ask to provide ID and card used to make the payment. Otherwise, it would cost me a little extra for them to ship out the tickets and I'm not waiting on that.

No matter, I've done it. Bought five tickets of shows in the span of four days. Four Alter Bridge shows in four different cities, and one Shinedown show at the Wiltern Theater in LA. I say that's a good start for my 2020 year of concert going.

[anguyen92]

Wow, $71 for GA/pit in LA?? Damn, that's steep for an AB show. It's just $36 here in Denver. Well, good for them (and the promoter) if they can sell out at that price. I hope they do.

As a follow-up answer, Greg. I've looked at Ticketmaster today, GA Pit is all sold out there in the Wiltern show. That stated, there's bound to be a lot of tickets in the secondary markets to go for around $150+, because people are monsters like that wants to profit off of people and want to suck every ounce of money out of some desperate fans wanting a GA Pit. Well, I'm not relinquishing my ticket for any price, especially for the LA show.

Also, I've checked on Stubhub, there are some morons that are listing a regular GA ticket for $1,200.00 and one Pit ticket for $1,155.00. There are still plenty of regular GA tickets for $48 (fees included). I don't care how big any band is, people should not pay $1,200.00 for any band that's on an ongoing tour. Maybe, except The Rolling Stones and Paul McCartney since they are getting really to that expiration date and who knows if anyone will see them in their locations again in the near future that you can reason yourself to spend $1,000.00+ for just a ticket. With that money, you can travel to England and see an AB arena show at GA and still probably have some money left over.

[The Dissident]

The cards are falling more into place, might call in later today to purchase tickets for the show. Still annoyed that it won't let me purchase them online despite being in the catchment zone for what is being advertised as allowed

[anguyen92]

They are going to be on the Saturday at the Epicenter (formerly known as Carolina Rebellion) in North Carolina on the Saturday. Here's the poster.

[MrsPog]

Wow, $71 for GA/pit in LA?? Damn, that's steep for an AB show. It's just $36 here in Denver. Well, good for them (and the promoter) if they can sell out at that price. I hope they do.

As a follow-up answer, Greg. I've looked at Ticketmaster today, GA Pit is all sold out there in the Wiltern show. That stated, there's bound to be a lot of tickets in the secondary markets to go for around $150+, because people are monsters like that wants to profit off of people and want to suck every ounce of money out of some desperate fans wanting a GA Pit. Well, I'm not relinquishing my ticket for any price, especially for the LA show.

Also, I've checked on Stubhub, there are some morons that are listing a regular GA ticket for $1,200.00 and one Pit ticket for $1,155.00. There are still plenty of regular GA tickets for $48 (fees included). I don't care how big any band is, people should not pay $1,200.00 for any band that's on an ongoing tour. Maybe, except The Rolling Stones and Paul McCartney since they are getting really to that expiration date and who knows if anyone will see them in their locations again in the near future that you can reason yourself to spend $1,000.00+ for just a ticket. With that money, you can travel to England and see an AB arena show at GA and still probably have some money left over.

That is nuts. I saw Iron Maiden on their last UK stadium tour, they printed your name on the tickets. Simple and great idea to stop stupid resale prices.

I was lucky enough to see AB at The Royal Albert Hall. It broke my heart to see a number of empty seats. Something really needs to be done about resale websites.

[anguyen92]

^^ It's a cruel reality to see, but that's actually what happens when a band is uberpopular in a certain location. I wish the band can do something about it, but I don't want to see them go through what Pearl Jam went through when they challenged Ticketmaster in the 90s. That seems like an ugly hole to get out of and AB is almost out of their personal hole that they went through in the Wind-Up Records contract buyout. No need for them to get back into a hole.

That's why I'm not sweating much or be mad as much on why AB isn't as big here in the states. Aside from the GA Pit ticket at the LA show (which is honestly steep compared to what other bands are selling in that section), the tickets here are reasonable enough (around $40.00-45.00 fees included) and will still be on sale for a good while before the tour begins.

[austin.]

Staind and Alter Bridge the Saturday in between Metallica sets in Charlotte?


Dream come true

[gbruin]

because people are monsters

Enough said.

[abw1987]

Lol that's a little dramatic. Can't blame people for recognizing an opportunity! The real tragedy is that bands feel they can't charge market value for their tickets over fear of being seen as greedy. If they did, the money would go where it belongs: to the bands – rather than to the scalper "monsters".

[anguyen92]

Well, technically, any ticket sales that are bought through Ticketmaster is going to go into the hands of Live Nation, since I would think AB gets paid via guarantees from them regardless on how many tickets are sold in the tour.

Now I rechecked the Wiltern show on Ticketmaster and see that the GA Pit tickets are on sale again, but it's now tiered as "Platinum" pricing and going to around $180.00 fees included (note that I paid $71.00 when I got it first day of presale). Around the same ballpark as what Stubhub has listed for those tickets. This is Live Nation's approach to combat secondary tickets sites and try to make more money that scalpers could have made. Don't know if this is a good move that helps the fans though......

[abw1987]

Source? Not disputing you, as I know that's a valid method many bands choose to structure the economics of their touring deals. I've just never read anything to that effect about AB specifically, so I assume they operate under the traditional model where the ticket broker just gets a cut of any tickets sold.

Even if they did have things set up that way, I'd have no quarrel with my extra money going to Live Nation. Some bands may prefer to reduce their risk exposure by agreeing to guarantees rather than a percentage of ticket sales, or some combination thereof – and that's perfectly valid. In that case, it's the band's choice, so the extra money would rightfully belong to Live Nation. That's their business model and if that's how bands choose to work with them, so be it.

Regardless, I stand by my original point that bands should be able to price their tickets at market value without fans calling them out as greedy or sellouts. It may not "help the fans" at first glance, but I argue it would create more sustainable economics to allow bands and the broader live music ecosystem to flourish over the long term.

With that said, I recognize not all fans can afford $180 tickets. I certainly would prefer not to have to. I'm sure many bands would continue to offer cheaper tickets as an act of goodwill to their less affluent fans. That is, of course, also their choice, and there are lots of ways to do so. E.g., private presales, names tickets that cannot be transferred, etc.

Anyway, probably a debate to have in another thread. It just grinds my capitalist gears to see free market entrepreneurs demonized for seizing opportunities created by what is in my opinion a broken system of original ticket pricing.

[anguyen92]

Source? Not disputing you, as I know that's a valid method many bands choose to structure the economics of their touring deals. I've just never read anything to that effect about AB specifically, so I assume they operate under the traditional model where the ticket broker just gets a cut of any tickets sold.

I don't have a source, sorry. I always thought the standard practice on how big bands get paid nowadays was based off a guarantee, no matter how many tickets are sold in a tour, and didn't see any valid reasons why AB would be an exception to that practice. I would think how a tour gets planned would be for the band manager to talk to their booking agent to want to do a tour. Booking agent talks to promoters to see what dates and venues are available and everyone all congregates to negotiate a certain price that all parties (bands, manager, promoters, agent) would be happy with to convince the band to do this tour and the price to pay the band themselves. That price comes out of the promoters' pocket and the promoter recoup (with the aim to make huge profits as they are a business) based on ticket sales, or so I would think.

I don't know if that is actually how it goes, but that's my analysis of it based off of a book on concert promotion that I read when I was doing an industry study of the touring industry back in college for a class.

I'll go ahead and edit my post.

Anyway, probably a debate to have in another thread. It just grinds my capitalist gears to see free market entrepreneurs demonized for seizing opportunities created by what is in my opinion a broken system of original ticket pricing.

I see your point when its spinned that way. Those guys are capitalizing on the broken system where more demand and less supply = price hike. If I was more of a shrewd business guy more than the uber AB fan that I am and snagged the GA pit ticket, I would probably relist it to a price that's steep that I would think people would pay and that's fair game in this capitalism economy. However, I was looking at it from a fan's perspective on why someone would list a ticket for $1,000.00 on a site like Stubhub where they can get the same tickets for $48.00 or how Ticketmaster initially had Pit tickets sold out, but it's on secondary sites for like 2.5 times the price, and now Ticketmaster has those tickets at those prices after a few days.

It just doesn't seem fair to the fans that was not able to get the tickets right away at the initial advertised price during the week it first went on sale. Of course, it doesn't matter to me, I buy the tickets first day on presale no matter what, even if, for some odd reason, I can't make the show (which would be really awkward since I am planning a trip that includes going to this show).

[abw1987]

No worries, and I didn't mean for you to edit your post! I haven't heard much about that side of AB's business so I thought you might have some interesting sources. In any case, it sounds like you are more of an expert on the topic given your research background.

I'm not sure why someone would post a ticket for $1,000 . It could be a single seller using a technique called anchoring, where they list most of their tickets at $48 but one at $1,000. People see the $1,000 ticket, and they know it's a ridiculous price, but subconsciously it makes $48 seem comparatively reasonable.

[gbruin]

It just grinds my capitalist gears to see free market entrepreneurs demonized for seizing opportunities created by what is in my opinion a broken system of original ticket pricing.

There's a fine line between seizing an economic opportunity and gouging a populace that has no recourse. The pharmaceutical industry faces similar circumstances and has displayed a variety of responses from noble to satanic. The right answer isn't where to draw the line but rather to fix the broken system, but neither you nor Kev nor I can do that, and the industry that could fix it has no incentive to do so, so the broken system continues on. That's a shame.

I also might be mistaken, but I don't think the band sets the final prices. I believe anguyen is correct that it comes from the promoters. They book the band and venue and then price tickets at what they think they can sell for maximal profit. Honestly, $180 to be up front for AB seems crazy expensive. I've quit seeing a few bands I love (e.g., Journey, Def Lep) because the prices are insane. If it were just me, that's one thing, but there are a lot more responsible things I can do with a family and $250.

[The Dissident]

Finally managed to get tickets to Seattle, gonna be a long day and the next morning is gonna be rough but oh so worth it