Springsteen: Hard To Be A Saint In The Rock 'N' Roll City
Posted Fri Feb 6, 2009 4:40pm PST by Blender Magazine in The Blender Burner
You're Bruce
Springsteen and you've
just played the greatest halftime show in the history of the Super Bowl. What
are you going to do? Why, put the tickets for your U.S. tour up on sale, of course!
Because, after all, there were an awful lot of people watching the Super Bowl,
right? And you rocked them harder than humans deserve to be rocked, right? So
they'll
want to come see your show now more than ever, right? Right!
But wait, there's
a problem here--when Springsteen tickets went
on sale last week, Bruce fans flooded Ticketmaster's site looking for a fix, and many
in the New Jersey
area got error messages telling them to try back later. When they did, they
found out the shows were sold out--nooooooo!--but
they still had a chance: A link would take them to TicketsNow (Ticketmaster's resale site)
where they could buy seats for a lot more than face value. In the old days,
before the miracle of the Internet, this used
to be called scalping, and wouldn't you know it, such a fuss ensued
that the New Jersey State Attorney General has launched an investigation and
Bruce put a message up on his site saying he was just as angry as everyone
else. (Ticketmaster apologized too.)
Bruce has done his share of apologizing recently, saying his team goofed up by letting their record company give an exclusive hits CD to Wal Mart, a place that's not traditionally a friend to the union guys Springsteen sings about. You know the old Springsteen song about how it's hard to be a saint in the city? Sometimes it's hard to be a saint in the world of rock 'n' roll too (sometimes? always!), but Bruce Springsteen will keep trying.
The Bruce ticket screw-up is hardly the only concert flub in rock history, which includes Kanye keeping his fans waiting until nearly dawn, Axl Rose not showing up at all, and the great tradition of fans throwing bottles. Burner takes a look...
But wait, there's
a problem here--when Springsteen tickets went
on sale last week, Bruce fans flooded Ticketmaster's site looking for a fix, and many
in the New Jersey
area got error messages telling them to try back later. When they did, they
found out the shows were sold out--nooooooo!--but
they still had a chance: A link would take them to TicketsNow (Ticketmaster's resale site)
where they could buy seats for a lot more than face value. In the old days,
before the miracle of the Internet, this used
to be called scalping, and wouldn't you know it, such a fuss ensued
that the New Jersey State Attorney General has launched an investigation and
Bruce put a message up on his site saying he was just as angry as everyone
else. (Ticketmaster apologized too.)Bruce has done his share of apologizing recently, saying his team goofed up by letting their record company give an exclusive hits CD to Wal Mart, a place that's not traditionally a friend to the union guys Springsteen sings about. You know the old Springsteen song about how it's hard to be a saint in the city? Sometimes it's hard to be a saint in the world of rock 'n' roll too (sometimes? always!), but Bruce Springsteen will keep trying.
The Bruce ticket screw-up is hardly the only concert flub in rock history, which includes Kanye keeping his fans waiting until nearly dawn, Axl Rose not showing up at all, and the great tradition of fans throwing bottles. Burner takes a look...
I was sent to the TicketsNow.com site and for two separate events,one sports and one music, the price for two of the absolute worst (cheape$t?!) seats would have been $750 US.These were regular season regular schedule game seats and the music event was for totally obstructed view for $3,500 US for two seats.
It's not worth it!
And as far as the unions go, they are helping to tear down our econony, one lazy worker at a time.