U2's Vertigo tour has left Scots fans furious in a row over ticket bungles and prices.
The tour hits the national stadium, Hampden Park, on June 21st. But yesterday, Scots fans were angry and out of pocket. They were among 50,000 fans in Europe who paid £21.30 each to the bands official website for access to "pre-sales" tickets (at least Queen never charged us for that). But when the pre-sales opened yesterday, online ticket seller's Ticketmaster's system was swamped, so many fans could not get through. When they managed to get the codes they had been given by the website to work, they found the cheapest £50 tickets had gone. But internet touts were last night already offering them at inflated prices.
British fans are also furious that while the website codes offer American concert goers a discount, the same doesnt apply in Europe. And the cost of the "privilege" membership along with booking fees takes the price of the cheapest ticket for the Glasgow gig to more than £80. Fans also complain the cost of tickets has risen astronomically from previous U2 tours.
Last night, U2 apologised to fans via their website and a spokesman said the booking problem was because the huge demand meant the Ticketmaster site had 3.3 million hits in one day.
In addition, some users had their codes disabled. Ticketmaster have now contacted them to say their coeds have been reset and they still have plenty of time to book before the public sale.
Last night, European tour promoter John Giddings defended the cost, saying "U2's prices are not high. Prices for the Vertigo tour are in line with recent stadium tours. U2 work very hard to keep their prices reasonable."
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What a fuck up.....
deleted user 27.01.2005 12:26
Typical of Ticketmaster. Well 'spose it wasnt their fault that U2 has some many millions of fans, like Queen, who all wanted tickets. Shame on them
Another f****** f*** up from ticketmaster. Overinflated prices for an overrated live band in my opinion but tour will sell out anyway. General sale starts tomorrow I believe. I won't be going......way too expensive. I'll save my cash for the godfathers and founders of stadium rock...Queen. Even without Freddie,John and with Paul singing they'd shit on U2.
deleted user 27.01.2005 16:33
I heard that on the radio. Cross my fingers that that won't happen on the Queen tour.
One of the five best non-Queen concerts I ever attended was U2......back in '87 at the Pontiac Silverdome during The Joshua Tree tour....utterly fantastic. Pity that 'Rattle and Hum' effed up the experience. All they would have had to do was tape that or Sun Devil Stadium performances in color, and it would have been one of the best videod concerts ever.
To pay those prices for them now, and to fight over them, especially after such a lame studio project as 'Atomic Bomb'.......the public cries for something better
btw....don't whine over Q+PR....wish we Yanks had the chance. Seeing B and R, with a decent light rig and some fair female vocals to help, will be the envy of all of Queendom
j+III
j+III
This whole fiasco started when U2 through their website U2.com offered a membership fee with exclusive access to a secret password which allowed fans to buy pre-sale tickets for the upcoming Vertigo Tour. The cost of the membership was $40. Aside from that fans were already complaining about the high cost of the tickets for the upcoming tour, which was from $54 to $170. I found out that the same seats for which I paid $60 back in 2001 for the 'Elevation Tour', were now $100! Can you believe it?!
The worst came when Ticketmaster decided to put all the dates on the tour on sale the exact same day, which eventually caused jams on the phone lines, the Ticketmaster website, and the Ticketmaster locations. Aside from that, fans complained that they received errors after typing the password correctly many times, or were given the wrong seat choice from the one that they picked when they were able to log in. So imagine the frustration of spending $40 for absolutely nothing. Sadly to many U2 fans, by the time they got access to the tickets, they found out that many of the shows have been all sold out. The luckiest ones were only able to get seats quite far from the stage.
I would put most of the blame on Ticketmaster. They know that scalpers are making a huge profit out of ripping-off music fans, and they simply don't give a flying fuck. Wouldn't surprise me if it was the scalpers the ones who are secretely working for Ticketmaster and then selling the tickets from $300 to even $1.000. Besides, music fans (and I say it by personal experience) know that Ticketmaster and Clear Channel Entertainment are nothing but evil and greedy corporations that want to find the worst ways to squeeze every single penny possible from music fans.
I am a member of U2.com because my good friend is a rabid U2 fan, and that way I can get her tickets for another venue as well as the ones she purchases, as she always like to see more than one show when they tour. I was online trying to get tickets for the San Diego show from 1:00 pm till 4:45 pm, solid. Everytime I'd get through, and put in my ticket request, the transaction would fail just before the order would go through, and I would be informed there was an error that had occured. I finally got the tickets, but it was just maddening.