Jackson Jambalaya

Yeah, someone should be brave enough to take them on. Forcing unwilling people to not only attend events but pay such prices ought to be illegal. And in fact, it is. The problem is that Ticketmaster does not do that. But when Ticketmaster or any other ticket-seller starts doing that, I'll stand with those who fight to stop them. Until then, the answer is simple - don't buy the fucking tickets. You know, just like what people do when they either do not want to pay the asking price or cannot afford to pay it for completely discretionary purchases. Shocking as it may come to some, but you do not have a "right to par-TAY." You can fight for it, but you do not have it and it'll be a long, hard fight. Which you probably will not win. Sorry, Dee - I'll allow you are on to something with the idea, but you are slap-ass wrong on the law.

No one is forced. What we, as consumers, don't understand is that we hold all the power. All we have to do is stop consuming and prices would come down, and it wouldn't take long either. To quote Pogo, "We have met the enemy and he is us."

I think the last national act concert ticket I bought was around $15.

Agreed. In Clownworld, everyone's a victim. Makes for good press.

Google "
blue dot fever"

MS Symphony concerts at Thalia Mara have gone way up. If you want to go, you pay. This summer my wife and I are going to fly to a different country to attend a music festival. Seeing three major artists for less than 500 US in ticket costs.

As far as the video- I’m sure the Indy venue is similar to Duling Hall. Great atmosphere, proximity to the performer and probably hearing more creative music than the mass produced popular music product anyway.

The artists should just make the tickets non-transferable and not allow mass purchases. Ticketmaster would certainly oppose this because they make fees every time a ticket is resold, either by them or scalpers. Same with sports tickets. You can't go, you eat the ticket. Of course, when they got rid of paper tickets they knew what they were doing - making digital ticket transfers required if you bought a package of 4 season tickets. No more giving your buddy or even your kid a paper ticket. Of course, if they want to resell it they have to go old school and collect the money themselves. The explosion of high prices is technology and artist driven.

I have never understood the allure of concerts. I can buy the music to listen anytime I want versus hearing it waaaay to loud, dealing with rude concert fans, and getting gouged by the box office.

I went to the Dan Fogelberg and Billy Joel concerts at Thalia Mara Hall. Ticket price for both concerts was $3.00.

Where is the FTC on this? Don't we have anti-trust laws against monopolies?

Since we as consumers have all the power, I have a great idea - let’s do away with all anti-trust laws and let the big monopolies reestablish themselves. Have one nationwide cell phone carrier, one nationwide grocery chain, one airline, etc. They would treat us fairly since we have the power. Let’s go for it!

Good video. But blaming expensive concerts for the loneliness issues in America is a silly notion. People do not share their deepest longings with others when the music is too loud to hear such longings while surrounded by 80,000 people. When the video makes such goofy claims it makes me question the validity of its other claims.

So Merrick Garland attacked the problem and nothing happened? Geez, what a shock. Garland was the enemy of the people. Garland was easily the worst attorney General in my lifetime.

@8:23am - With the current criminals in charge, laws are only enforced selectively.

I believe I read somewhere Taylor Swift concert tickets were $1500, and more. Ridiculous. But 1,000,000,000 Taylor Swift fans can’t be wrong, as with Elvis Presley. The only way for those prices to come down is for people to stop buying them until they do come down. My niece recently informed my that Taylor Swift is the Elvis for their time. I don’t get it, but I’m not supposed to.

So, Pocahontas and Pete Butt can kill the Southwest Airlines-Jet Blue merger with a combined 24.5% market share, but no one will touch TicketMaster/LiveNation with damn-near 100% captive?

Actually they did. Justice filed suit against it in 2024. Trump Justice continued working the case. Then in mid-trial, Justice settled after Ticketmaster hired Kellyanne Conway and some other Trump people. 33 states kept going and won at trial. Damages phase upcoming.

Mitch McConnell's one shining moment.

... Southwest Airlines-Jet Blue ...

You obviously aren't qualified to comment.

I just checked… Taylor Swift tickets can range from $50 for upper level seats to $2000 and up for VIP tickets.I don’t get it, but many do. “Remember the King”

Excuse me - there were so many in the mix at different points. Spirit Airlines which is even worse; only 10% market share. Maybe KF can hire you as hall monitor.

Someone needs to go after them all! A hard-loaded crewcab 4x4 special edition pickemup truck can top $100K and that doesn't even include the Yeti OR the stickers, which done also gone way up! Fillet minyon is now around $20 a pound! Natties are closin' in on $30 a 30! Crown and coke are both real spensive! Why, shitfar, me and the ol' ladie was down on the coast playin' the slots and them crooks wanted nearly $100 for us to eat a few plates of danged ol' crab legs and prime rib! I'm tellin' ya, all we need to do is elect Donald J. Trump president and he'll Make America Great Aga...Oh, wait. Nevermind. Ya know, a few billion for a real nice dancehall seems reasonable. Besides with $18 a gallon gas that pickemup woulda done cut into the Nattie budget anyways.

Everybody grow a pair (respectfully stated of course) and listen to 7:37 & 8:08 above. Want to see (and hear) what you might be getting at these expensive boondoggles? Watch some very informative and distressing podcasts on an internet outlet that highlights pre-recorded, lip-synced, tone-adjusted singalongs by the big-ticket (pun intended) stage performers for the outrageous ticket prices you'll pay. Those artists even dazzle you with their b******t-for-brains opinions on politics and how to live your life. Want to spend less money and see some good stuff? Find smaller venues and support local and emerging artists. Or take up amateur astronomy...

well stated @9:37, finally, some logic in da house

Taylor Swift is an example of how marketing plays a role in pop culture. She is what was shoved down the throats of people by saturation causing them to think she is a great singer. She can only play the virgin teenager so long.

Actually, Swift has been one of the main ones defending artists against streaming and the Ticketmaster monopoly. She can command premium prices but she is an outlier.

One thing left out of video is how streaming destroyed the profits for artists. No more getting rich off a platinum album. They now have to make their money on the tours, which of course pushes up the prices as well.

Streaming and before that digital thievery.

Live music used to be everywhere in small venues. If you are younger than 60 you don't remember because that era has been gone since it died in the 1980s.

There was a whole ecosystem of artists, promoters and local venues that gave you an amazing choice of performers to see for a really low cover charge or ticket price.

In any city of any size newspapers and the free papers published weekly live music calendars. Most of the bars and other venues also advertised who was performing in the newspapers.

There was no MTV, no interent. There was still local radio and it was real local people.

If you went regularly you could see a lot of good and some great performances. Occasionally you saw performers or bands you had never heard of on the way to making it big, other times they were bands and miusicians treading water or on the way down.

U-2 in early 1981 for $5.00 cover in a bar.
Drinks were cheap.

Perhaps K.F. should post some C.L. and Jackson News screenshots from 60s and 70s to show how great it was.
Are there screenshots of The Kudzu online?

There was always theft of copyrighted recorded music whether it was commercial bootlegging or people recording an album to casette.

The internet just put the amount theft on steroids. Napster in 1999 anyone? Infinite copies you could distribute for free.

Then the commercial streamers came with all the hammers and nails to finish the job.

in the 1910s congress passed the first of the big antitrust laws to bust up big monopolies.
the government went after Rockefeller and standard oil and eventually broke the company into about 5 other companies to create competition.
rockefeller defense to all of it was ''my products are the finest quality at the lowest possible price''.
but it didn't work, even though it was true.

Taylor Swift is grandma-friendly. Granny's buying the tickets. She's DESPERATE to MATTER to her posterity. And since Taylor's tat-free and free of piercings and wears nice clothes - and is white - and has nice straight blonde hair - and is pretending to be in love with that nice underendowed football boy who's pretending to be interested in her, Taylor is the one GanGan is willing to whip out her Black Card and buy tickets for her granddaughters to see in concert.