Springsteen, Phish Have Beef With Ticketmaster, Live Nation

Posted on Feb 5th 2009 11:00AM by Benjy Eisen
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For the second time in a week, Bruce Springsteen finds himself unlikely paired with Phish in the news. This one isn't quite as sunny as the Bonnaroo announcement, but does attest to two specific qualities that both acts clearly share: 1) a nation of die-hard fans, and 2) a reciprocal commitment to those fans.

Now that the days of camping out at the local mall for tickets has come and gone -- and now that you can purchase tickets online from any internet connection in the world -- concerts from superstars such as Springsteen or Phish can literally sell-out instantly. And they have been ... except for this past weekend when Live Nation's new ticketing system couldn't handle the demand of all those Phish fans clamoring for tickets to every show. In a rare statement to fans, Phish apologized for the mess: "Clearly the system was unable to handle the extraordinary demand. We're very sensitive to making the process of getting Phish tickets as straightforward as possible," reads a message on their website.

Both Phish fans and Springsteen fans became irate at Ticketmaster when they went to purchase tickets only to be redirected to TicketsNow -- a secondary ticket site where "brokers" (or, as we used to call them, scalpers) offered up seats for hundreds of dollars above face value. This happened from the very moment tickets first went on sale. Oh and ... Ticketmaster owns TicketsNow.

On Wednesday, Springsteen fired off an open letter to Ticketmaster, condemning their actions. By the end of the day, Irving Azoff, CEO of Ticketmaster Entertainment, posted a response. It reads, in part, "While we were genuinely trying to do the right thing for fans in providing more choices when the tickets they requested from the primary on-sale were not available, we clearly missed the mark."

The letter, which apologized outright to Springsteen, his manager, his tour team and his fans, publicly states that Ticketmaster will never again link to TicketsNow "in a manner that can possibly create any confusion during a high-demand on-sale." Additionally, Ticketmaster will seek artist and venue approval before presenting a direct TicketsNow option from Ticketmaster.