Tuesday, March 25, 2008

Obtaining concert tickets in the space age

OK, so things have changed. How many are you old enough to remember what it took to buy concert tickets? Did you have to take a day off from work? Did you have to ditch school? Did you have to wake up way early in the morning and drag yourself to the venue box office, get on line with people who have already been there hours earlier and hope for a good seat?

Used to be how it went. And maybe in some parts, it's still like that. Is it like that everywhere still? I don't know. All I know is that now, in order to get a ticket for a show, you got to the box office or get them on-line. And now they have this thing where you are alerted pre-sale tickets. You know, where YOU get a chance to buy a ticket before it goes on sale to the public. Meanwhile, everyone is getting that e-mail. It's nonsense really because I've never gotten a good seat during the pre-sales.

So I really want to see Goldfrapp at Beacon Theatre. It's a special place for me. It's the first venue I went to for my first concert experience. That being Depeche Mode on March 16, 1985.

In the past few years, I would try to get these tickets online and if I didn't quite like the seat, I would "search again" and it would pick a different seat each time until I could find one that's satisfactory and purchase it. This time around though it wasn't doing it. I kept getting the same nasty seat. So I came back the next day and still I was getting the real bad seats, like the ones in the "Obstructed View" area. Who wants that??

I let it go for a week or so. My only risk was that the show would be sold out. But I had a hunch that the *GOOD SEATS* were going to be open for the later sales. Turns out I was right. And it's been like that all along. And you possibly know this. I've always gotten better seats when I came in later in the game then when the sales first started.

So the lesson is: Pre-sale doesn't exactly mean you're getting the front center row. If anyone has gotten these seats on the pre-sales, then let me know. You want a good seat, wait around a little and then go for it. But then you risk the "sell out" thing.

2 comments:

Yuяi said...

So you scored good tickets to Goldfrapp? That's awesome! I don't think I'd have the patience to come back later, as you did. I'd have a nervous breakdown or something before then. Not good! Clearly, patience has paid off. Good for you.

V said...

Oh yeah, compared to what I was getting before, the ticket I scored recently is way better than the pre-sale one they were offering.