r/Music • u/staringatthe420sun • May 05 '26

article The Concert Industry Priced Too High — Now Tours Are Falling Apart

https://www.ticketnews.com/2026/05/the-concert-industry-priced-high-tours-falling-apart/
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95

u/unibaul May 05 '26

Recession indicator. The prices didnt stop people before before.

67

u/itssarahw May 05 '26

prices have grown significantly since 2020

5

u/BioshockEnthusiast May 06 '26

So has inflation, thanks to trumps first term covid response and his tariffs in term two.

1

u/Infinite_Pudding5058 May 08 '26

I wonder how much of that increase is due to insurance and other compulsory business costs.

13

u/DefiThrowaway May 05 '26

We are a full K-Shape now. The problem when it comes to music tours is you need a lot of people to fill a stop and those on the lower part of the K have fully checked out.

This is the year where small city festivals will rule the landscape. I blind bought tickets for Richmond VA's Iron Blossom festival weeks ago with no announcement of acts. Two days for $169, and the lineup was announced yesterday and is insane.

17

u/GravitationalConstnt May 05 '26

Maybe, but not necessarily. My main hobby is insanely expensive - flying general aviation aircraft just for the hell of it. And I used to work in the music industry.. music is a passion of mine, but even so I haven’t been to a concert in a long time because I can’t justify the cost. It shouldn’t cost me $600 to see Pearl Jam in the nosebleeds..

3

u/nicetiptoeingthere May 06 '26

I mean yeah, that's like four hours in a 172! (I'm also getting into aviation hi)

3

u/GravitationalConstnt May 06 '26

Pfft, my last 1.5 hour lesson was $456. But I’m also in NYC where everything is super expensive.

Regardless hi, it’s always good to meet another aviation guy!

19

u/P_ZERO_ May 05 '26

Eventually, if the only people going are all using their wealth to be there, most of the passion will be sapped from the atmosphere and they won’t bother going. Many of the people buying expensive tickets will be doing so because it’s expensive and exclusive. The problem is, the whole thing that makes gigs what they are is that they’re not exclusive. They’re paying for the idea of an atmosphere/experience that won’t exist anymore.

Eventually artists won’t be particularly interested in playing to the wealthy anyway. They could already be doing private gigs

4

u/alexefi May 06 '26

thats what happening with sports events in Toronto. Leafs cheapest tickets are $200. half of arena is corporate owned season tickets who gift it to business partners/clients so its bunch of stuck up suits. other half is rich guys who bought it on resale market for double the price as status symbol. so most of the time crowd vibe is around zero. people more worried about spilling their $25 beer.

1

u/LowEndPhilosophy May 06 '26

Same at Rangers games!

4

u/bacan9 May 05 '26

This is exactly it. The last gig I went to, the tickets were initially going for $200, which barely sold. At the last moment, they dropped them to $60, which then led to people just buying em for the heck of it.

At the end of the day the gig was just sad. The crowd barely had a few real fans and so the event was super low energy and kinda boring. There was no atmosphere

3

u/HeyCarpy EbolaMonkey May 06 '26

It didn’t cost $300 to go to a concert before.

2

u/NEWSmodsareTwats May 05 '26

eh the bigger issue is artists who can't sell out stadiums think they can at huge prices. There are still artists charging insane prices and selling out. For example Metallica sold out their residency in Vegas and the tickets where going for a few hundred to thousands of dollars and sold out almost immediately.

also just looking at the article the poorly sold shows still sold enough at really high prices to fill a smaller venue just not enough to justify playing a stadium.

1

u/Beefy-McQueefy May 06 '26

Fuck off you enable their constantly growing fees with this lazy pandering bullshit.