concerts

(Sam Howzit)

Police: Don’t Bring Homemade Toilets To Jimmy Buffett Concerts, Then Leave’em For Others To Clean Up

What’s a Parrothead to do when they’ve been wasting away in Margaritaville and the lines to the bathroom are too long? Apparently, there’s a bucket for that. Police in Mansfield, MA say Jimmy Buffett fans really need to stop bringing their own homemade toilets to concerts at the local arena, because not only are the tailgaters relieving themselves outside of sanctioned restrooms, they’re leaving their latrine creations behind for someone else to deal with. [More]

(Sadat Shami)

Ticketmaster Sells Me Useless Parking Pass, Won’t Give Me A Refund

Adam recently attended a performance by comedian Kevin Hart in Boston, a city where parking is scarce and expensive. Ticketmaster offered him the opportunity to pay for his parking in advance along with his tickets, and he did. Doing so didn’t simplify his night out, though, since there was no one at the automated garage to accept his parking pass. He paid with a credit card and sought a refund from Ticketmaster later. They wouldn’t give him one, until Consumerist intervened… and also learned how the parking garage really worked. [More]

This is not, we repeat not, Jack White's guacamole. (photo: Morton Fox)

University Of Oklahoma Blacklisted After Publishing Jack White’s Guacamole Recipe

One of the most powerful talent representation companies in the world has decided to boycott the University of Oklahoma after a school newspaper dared to publish the rather bland details of a concert contract rider, including the rock star’s secret (not any longer) recipe for guacamole. [More]

How To Avoid Getting Duped When Buying Tickets Online

How To Avoid Getting Duped When Buying Tickets Online

Purchasing tickets to see your favorite musician in concert or to cheer on the hometown team should be a relatively pain-free, if not exciting, experience. But with the onset of new technology and less-than-truthful resellers, a shadow of deception can cloud consumers’ ticket buying decisions. [More]

StubHub Music App Doesn’t Play Nice With Ticketmaster

StubHub Music App Doesn’t Play Nice With Ticketmaster


The StubHub Music app, which just launched to a national audience, aims to connect music lovers with concert tickets. And if a show isn’t sold out, the reseller will sometimes even point you to tickets you can buy from the venue — but not if those tickets are being sold by Ticketmaster. [More]

Yeah Yeah Yeahs Ask Concertgoers To Say No No No To Using Their Phones During Show

Yeah Yeah Yeahs Ask Concertgoers To Say No No No To Using Their Phones During Show

Since it seems that people can’t stop using their phones for even a few moments to enjoy a live concert, the members of the band Yeah Yeah Yeahs are taking the proactive step of telling fans to put their stupid smartphones away so they can remember what it was like to have a good time in 2005. [More]

Screw your wedding plans, these guys are in town.

Howard Johnson Gives Away Block Of Rooms Reserved For Wedding Because It Doesn’t Know How To Say No To Mumford & Sons Fans

A bride-to-be got some bad news last week about a block of rooms she’d reserved at a Howard Johnson Inn in St. Augustine — they had all been given away to Mumford & Sons fans and there was nothing that could be done about it. [More]

Madonna Booed For Showing Up 2.5 Hours Late For Own Concert

Madonna Booed For Showing Up 2.5 Hours Late For Own Concert

Concerts usually start later than the time on the ticket, but apparently 2.5 hours later (with only a DJ as your opening act) is a bit too late for the people of Philadelphia. The CBS affiliate in Philly is reporting that the crowd turned on Madonna when she finally took the stage at 10:30 pm (for an 8 pm show) but the boos were probably quieter than they could have been… because some concert-goers had already given up and left. [More]

Why Should Consumers Settle For Crappy Concert Sound?

Why Should Consumers Settle For Crappy Concert Sound?

Back during our comments outage, reader Chris wrote to us about an incredibly disappointing concert that he attended. The show wasn’t terrible because the artists weren’t any good: even if you don’t like country music, you have to grant that Kenny Chesney and Tim McGraw are hard-working, talented, and very attractive entertainers. No, Chris’s problem was that up in his seats on the upper level of the arena, the Angel Stadium of Anaheim, the sound quality was terrible, song lyrics impossible to decipher, and even spoken words in between songs impossible to understand. [More]

Fans Of The Who Allowed To Exchange Tickets From Cancelled Concert… 33 Years Later

Fans Of The Who Allowed To Exchange Tickets From Cancelled Concert… 33 Years Later

Back in 1979, a little band out of the UK called The Who was slated to play a show in Providence, Rhode Island. But after 11 people were killed during a stampede at a Who show in Ohio, the venue nixed the concert. In a few months, that same band will be playing that same venue, and folks who still have tickets to that cancelled performance are being allowed to exchange them for seats at the upcoming show. [More]

Ticketmaster To Lower Admission Prices On Poor-Selling Events

Ticketmaster To Lower Admission Prices On Poor-Selling Events

If no one’s buying tickets to events later this year, Ticketmaster will start to lower the price of admission as the date draws nearer. The concept, which it’s calling “dynamic pricing,” will punish early buyers and reward those who hold out until the days before a slow-selling event takes place. On the other hand, if ticket sales start speeding back up, Ticketmaster could raise the prices. [More]

Ticketmaster Settles Class Action Lawsuit

Ticketmaster Settles Class Action Lawsuit

If you bought a ticket from Ticketmaster between Oct ’99 and May ’10, get ready for some bucks/ticket discounts coming your way. Ticketmaster has agreed to settle a class action lawsuit brought against it in 2003 that alleged the ticket giant’s processing fees were just a “profit component” and didn’t recoup any actual costs of doing business. [More]

Ticketmaster Bungles My Concert Order, Supervisor Doesn't Care

Ticketmaster Bungles My Concert Order, Supervisor Doesn't Care

Joe ordered tickets to a John Mayer concert through Ticketmaster but was turned away at will call. His order didn’t go through because someone at the company input his credit card number incorrectly. He wants to run through the halls of his high school and scream at the top of his lungs: [More]

I Used Twitter To Score Free Concert Tickets And Get Cruel Live Nation Security Guard Fired

I Used Twitter To Score Free Concert Tickets And Get Cruel Live Nation Security Guard Fired

Jess took her ailing mom to see an American Idol concert in Massachusetts but was mistreated by employees who were less than willing to accommodate her mom’s special needs. The next day she took to Twitter, fired off a couple complaints and spurred Live Nation to make things right. [More]

Sony, Live Nation Are Conspiring To Keep Me Away From The Lilith Fair

Sony, Live Nation Are Conspiring To Keep Me Away From The Lilith Fair

Kevin is big enough of a man to admit he needs to get his Lilith Fair on. He was so pscyhed about getting his tickets as early as possible that he pre-ordered a Sarah McLachlan CD just to get a pre-sale concert code that gave him access to early tickets. [More]

Ticketmaster Charges You $2.50 To Print Your Own Ticket, $0 For Mail

Ticketmaster Charges You $2.50 To Print Your Own Ticket, $0 For Mail

Theoretically, companies charge you additional fees to offset costs of your more expensive choices. Or, to discourage or encourage certain behaviors. Ticketmaster, as usual, has a different idea. They charge you $2.50 for you to print your own ticket at home, and $0.00 to have them mail it to you. That’s a headscratcher, until you realize people printing their tickets at home are often last-minute people and if you’re in a rush you’re more likely to agree to additional fees if it gets the job done. [via Reddit] (Thanks to Bargaineering!) [More]

Ticketmaster Agrees To Only Sell Tickets It Has

Ticketmaster Agrees To Only Sell Tickets It Has

Ticketmaster has settled with the FTC over charges that it used “deceptive bait-and-switch” tactics when selling concert tickets, reports the Los Angeles Times. As usual for this kind of settlement, Ticketmaster admits no wrongdoing. For instance, the FTC noted that in one case “the same set of 38 tickets for the Springsteen concert in Washington were sold and resold 1,600 times,” and Ticketmaster waited as long as three months to let affected customers know, which is a clear example of not doing anything wrong. [More]

Speak Out Against Ticketmaster-Live Nation Merger At TicketDisaster.org

Speak Out Against Ticketmaster-Live Nation Merger At TicketDisaster.org

Yesterday a bunch of consumer advocates and anti-trust people held a press conference on Capitol Hill and asked the Department of Justice to block the Ticketmaster-Live Nation merger. If you, too, feel that this spells nothing but trouble for consumers–that a Ticketmaster-Live Nation monopoly would ruin competition and increase ticket prices–then check out the website TicketDisaster.org. From there, you can contact the DOJ to voice your opinion about the proposed merger, read up on reasons why the merger sucks for consumers and for the concert industry, and sign up for updates. (Thanks to JammingEcono!)