PreferredSeat.com Blog

Many of the winners of this years Grammy Awards are currently touring or will be touring soon and most of the artist are hoping the added attention helps their live concert ticket sales. The revenue from concert tours is becoming much more important now that cd sales are so low, and every bit of advertising such as the popular Grammy Awards can make a difference in ticket sales.

One of the biggest winners at this years Grammy Awards was Taylor Swift. Taylor walked away with Album of the Year and three more awards and she is currently on an already sold out concert tour that begins on March 4th in Tampa Florida. Even though the “Fearless Tour” is sold out through Ticketmaster, you can still find a huge selection of Taylor Swift tickets on the secondary market. The ticket prices for Taylor Swift are very high reflecting the demand for her first major arena tour, and as the tour dates draw closer it remains to be seen whether the prices will go up or down.

Beyonce was the clear winner on Grammy night as she took home a record six Grammy Awards including Song of the Year with “Single Ladies”. Beyonce recently finished touring and her sold out shows never needed any help anyway.

Lady Gaga was also a winner and a performer at the Grammies with two awards including Best Dance Recording. She is just finishing up a hugely successful tour of small venues and will likely be jumping to arena shows on the next tour.  Tickets for Lady Gaga are currently unavailable but expect quick sellouts the next time she tours.

Some more of the Grammy Award winners and  tour schedules:

Kings of Leon – Record of the Year – Currently not on tour

Zac Brown Band – Best New Artist – Zac Brown Band Tickets and Tour Dates

Jason Mraz – Best Male Pop Vocal Performance – Jason Mraz Tickets and Tour Dates

Black Eyed Peas- Best Pop Performance by a Dup or Group with Vocals – Black Eyed Peas Tickets and Tour Dates

Michael Buble – Best Traditional Pop Vocal Album – Michael Buble Tickets and Tour Dates

Bruce Springsteen – Best Solo Rock Vocal Performance – Currently not on tour

AC/DC – Best Hard Rock Performance – AC/DC Tickets and Tour Dates

Green Day – Best Rock Album – Currently not on Tour

Jay-Z – Best Solo Rap Performance – Jay-Z Tickets and Tour Dates

Lady Antebullum – Best Country Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocals - Lady Antebullum Tickets and Tour Dates with Tim McGraw on Tour

Carey Underwood & Randy Travis – Best Country Collaboration with Vocals – Carrie Underwood Tickets and Tour Dates

This weeks cheap tickets include another run by Bruce Springsteen as he plays the Wachovia Spectrum in Philadelphia on Tuesday October 13th and Wednesday the 14th. Concert Ticket prices are as low as $45 and up for what should be a great series of concerts.

Roger Daltrey

Roger Daltrey of the Who is playing solo tonight at the Showbox in Seattle, Washington, and prices have dropped to below $20 each for this general admission concert. You can’t beat this show for the chance to hear some classic Who songs at this price. The next show on his tour takes Roger to the Orpheum Theatre in Los Angeles, and that will be a fantastic venue for his concert.

Bob Dylan is playing three nights at the Palladium in Los Angeles, and the show is all general admission, but if Bob can stand for two hours, so can his fans I suppose.

Daughtrey is on tour and playing the Marquee Theater in Tempe, Arizona on Tuesday, this is also a general admission show and tickets are only $45 each.

Check out our Concert Ticket page for a complete list of concert tours.

The 25th Anniversary of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame will be highlighted by concerts at Madison Square Garden on October 29th and 30th to raise funds for the Hall of Fame. Each night will feature a different lineup and so far U2 and Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band, Eric Clapton and many more.

U2 Live

Robbie Robinson and Cameron Crowe are helping to plan and produce the HBO special, which will feature highlights from both nights at the Garden. The bands have been asked to play songs in tribute to their influences in music, so expect Bruce to be playing an Elvis song instead of Born to Run. The HBO special should run about 4 1/2 hours.

The tentative lineup for the concerts include:
U2
Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band
Eric Clapton
Crosby, Stills, Nash & Friends
Aretha Franklin
Metallica
Paul Simon playing solo and with Art Garfunkel
Stevie Wonder
Jeff Beck
Chuck Berry
Jackson Browne
Dion
Little Anthony & the Imperials
Jerry Lee Lewis
Little Richard
Sting
Van Morrison
James Taylor. And more artists to be added to the lineup.

Bruce Springsteen it turns out withholds hundreds of tickets for his concerts, as do most artists apparently, but in his case the BOSS ACT was brought forth because of his complaining that ticket scalping was keeping the best seats out of the hands of fans at exhorbitant prices.

Yet as reported in the Wall Street Journal Blog, “Now comes word, courtesy of an Open Public Records Act request from the Newark Star-Ledger, that the biggest reason fans couldn’t find good seats had nothing to do with Ticketmaster, TicketsNow, or scalpers.
In reality, almost none were ever actually, y’know, on sale. Instead, 90% of the best seats were reserved for friends and family of the band, venue employees, record-label executives and their guests.”.

And NJ.com reported “But an examination of ticket sale data from the May 21 concert shows Springsteen himself may be part of the problem. The best seats in the house that night were the 1,126 seats in the four sections closest to the stage, but only 108 of those tickets were ever for sale to the public, according to new ticket data obtained through the Open Public Records Act.”

Now I may not be an expert in this, but I’ve seen a lot of “comp” (free) tickets in my 22 years as one of the owners of Preferred Seating Tickets and all of these were from friends, family, employees, radio station, etc who were given the prime tickets, for free, but that’s not what they sold them to us for. And I would assume that when an artist such as Bruce Springsteen prepares to go on tour and determine the face value of the tickets for the tour, that they must take into account the 1200 tickets given to these friends, family, employees, etc because they will get no revenue from them and someone else must cover that cost. So my question is, are ticket prices adjusted higher to make up for the 1200 tickets given to friends, family, etc so they may have the pleasure of sitting up front, and those fans that helped pay for those “comp” (free) prime up front seats, can watch from the rear of the concert venue or stand on the floor the entire show?

For the record I’ve been a big fan of Bruce Springsteen since the early 70’s. I have ticket stubs from the Born in the USA tour signed by the now deceased promoter Bill Graham, who had an equal hatred of scalpers or ticket resellers, but who I still admired and respected for his work, just as I do for Bruce Springsteen. But like most people who complain about the ticket resell business and ticket brokers, they have hidden profit motives or interests that they fail to disclose.

Both The Dead and Bruce Springsteen are sharing a similar fate in ticket sales. Prices have plummeted for a number of cities on the current tours and The Dead Tickets and Bruce Springsteen tickets can be purchased for well below face value in some cases.

Some of the venues for cheap Springsteen tickets include:Philips Arena, Greensboro Coliseum.For the Dead, great prices can be found for the Nassau Coliseum and the Xcel Center.

It may have more to do with the economy, but this is the second time that Bruce has toured in only a few years and the Dead raised their prices so much they probably out priced many of their fans. Maybe smaller venues should be on the bill for the next tours, just don’t raise the prices!

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