Mick Jagger Explains Those $750 Rolling Stones Tickets
With the the Rolling Stones' two North American concert dates coming up fast, Billboard snagged Mick Jagger and Keith Richards, aka the legendary Glimmer Twins, for an interview about their band's 50th anniversary. In between questions about their two new tracks and what 2013 looks like for the Stones, they snuck in the question that's been on every fan's mind: What's up with these exorbitant ticket prices?
"You might say, 'The tickets are too expensive,'" Jagger responded (FYI, the best seats are going for $750 and the nosebleeds are $95). "Well, it's a very expensive show to put on, just to do four shows. Because normally you do a hundred shows and you'd have the same expenses. We can't, in four shows, change the whole ticketing system."
Jagger also pointed out that most of the tickets are selling (thanks to scalpers) at much steeper rates than what they're asking for. "Most of the tickets go for a higher price than we've sold them for, so you can see the market is there," Jagger said. "And I just want to point out that we don't get that difference."
He's right, of course. Some people are willing to shell out more than a thousand bones to see the living legends. But hearing the Stones—who are wealthy beyond traditional definitions of "filthy rich"—talk about ticket prices is like hearing Arrested Development's upper class matriarch Lucille Bluth trying to comprehend the cost of living ("How much could a banana cost? Ten dollars?").
So tickets that cost $95-750 probably seem more reasonable to the Stones than to fans. After all, for $750, you might as well buy a new laptop. Mick might be right, but the price tag still stings.
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