Concerts used to be the great equalizer. Didn’t matter if you were broke, working doubles at the gas station, or borrowing money from your parents—you could scrape together twenty bucks, buy a nosebleed, and still be in the room when the lights went down. You weren’t just watching music. You were part of something bigger.
That was the dream. The cheap seat meant access. The cheap seat meant community. The cheap seat meant everyone could enter the temple.
Now the temple’s got velvet ropes and algorithms at the door.
Michael Rapino gets onstage at yet another industry conference and calls concerts “underpriced.” Underpriced. The man who pocketed $100 million last year for running Live Nation, the company that turned fandom into a line item on a quarterly report, thinks you and I should be grateful for the privilege of paying triple digits to see our favorite bands.
His defense?
Averages.
The “average ticket” is $72, he says. Which is like a billionaire telling you the average American’s rich because Jeff Bezos lives here. Fans don’t experience averages.
Fans experience chaos:
Ticketmaster’s queues that crash, surge pricing that turns your phone into a slot machine, bots that eat the inventory before you even get a chance.
And none of that matters to Rapino. His job isn’t to make concerts magical. His job is to keep shareholders fat and happy. Lock down venues, ticketing, promotion, control the whole “flywheel.” No competition, no innovation, just fees on top of fees.
And here’s the thing: Rapino makes obscene money off culture but creates none of it himself. He doesn’t write the songs. He doesn’t play the shows. He doesn’t stand in the pit or wait in line. He’s just a toll collector at the gate. Steve Miller said it flat-out in his Rock Hall of Fame speech, how the suits profit off musicians while contributing nothing to the art. Rapino’s empire is built on that exact imbalance.
Concerts are underpriced?
No.
They just haven’t squeezed you enough yet.
Metallica’s 2025 Australian tour?
Gone.
Sold out before you could blink. Standard tickets running all the way up to $750, plus the insult of a “handling fee” slapped on like salt in the wound.
And that’s before the upsells, the premium reserves, the GA “enhanced experiences.” Those packages where you pay through the nose to feel like you’re not just a customer, but a valued customer.
Metallica still sells out because they’re one of the last universal rock metal bands. They are your dad’s band, your band, your kid’s band. The music has never been more available, stream every album in seconds, watch pro-shot live clips on YouTube for free. But the live experience, the reason you picked up a guitar or threw yourself into a pit, that’s become luxury-priced.
And yet, the shows still sell out. Which tells you everything. The desire hasn’t gone away. Fans will always pay. Until they can’t.
Dream Theater hits forty years, and their anniversary tour is already a test of devotion.
Melbourne? $159 just to get in.
Brisbane? $229.
Adelaide fans reporting $189 GA, with some reminiscing about the days you could walk in for $124.
Still cheaper compared to Metallica but…
Buying a ticket isn’t just an act of fandom anymore, it’s calculus. How much is too much? How many fees can you stomach? How many rows back until it’s not worth it? The music is meticulous, demanding, progressive. But the ticket-buying process is chaos, economics, market forces. It’s not prog, it’s Wall Street.
And the faithful still pay. Because that’s what it means to be a fan in 2026. You complain, you sigh, and then you show up anyway.
The Harsh Reality for Smaller Acts
But zoom out from Taylor Swift’s glittery Eras tour, the stadium gods, the more established bands and it’s brutal. The middle class of music is collapsing.
Smaller acts are grinding themselves into dust, endless tours through the same cities, like a clingy ex who doesn’t get the hint. Fans are tapped out, financially, emotionally. They’ve seen the show three times already. They’re not coming back just because you showed up again.
Add in the post-Covid hangover, ticket prices inflated, costs through the roof, and you’ve got an unsustainable mess. Vans turned into semis, sprinter vans into buses, overhead that kills. Meanwhile, fans are staring down their bank apps thinking: Do I really need to drop another forty bucks after paying a grand for Metallica last month?
This is where we are. Live music, once democratic, feels more like an airport lounge, corporate, exclusive, transactional.
And the problem isn’t just economics. It’s emotional connection. Fans don’t want perfect production anymore, they want authenticity.
The gatekeepers used to be labels. Now it’s fans. Viral one day, forgotten the next. The old formulas don’t work. The new ones aren’t obvious. The only constant? Connection. That’s it. That’s the whole game.
We’re in uncharted waters. The cheap seat is dead. The middle class of live music is bleeding out. The stadium shows are still printing money, but for how long?
The dream of concerts was always accessibility. Now it’s exclusivity. That’s the tragedy. Because the music hasn’t changed. The fans haven’t changed. Only the gatekeepers have.
And Rapino? He’ll keep cashing nine-figure checks off art he never made, off culture he never built. That was Steve Miller’s whole point when he stood at the Hall of Fame podium and called out the leeches: the suits don’t create, they extract.
The question is how long fans will let them.
destroyerofharmony 
This was awesome. Thanks for writing. I refuse to go to Stadium Shows because if I want to watch a big screen I’ll watch it on video when it comes out. There is no intimacy there. Arena shows are too overpriced. I’ll only catch smaller acts now in smaller venues as it is still reasonably priced. Unless is Standing Room Only, then it is a no as my knees can’t take that anymore!! LOL!!. I have two concerts coming up, but neither were overpriced and around a $100 a ticket (which is still too much, but at least doable).
I have Dream Theater and Evergrey coming up in Feb and May 2026. DT was $200 and Evergrey was $70.
Both are smaller venues which I prefer.
I passed on Metallica and AC/DC as they are stadium gigs and there is a festival in December which has Tool and Machine Head on the bill but that would be a pass as well, because of ticket prices and my body not being able to handle big gigs like these.
Goddamn, well f’ing said. But also very depressing isn’t it, seeing it in actual words what all us music lovers & fans are feeling every day when it comes to concerts. I’m w/ ya on totally turning my back on stadium shows. Let the young’uns pay hundred$ of dollars to sit hundreds of feet away & watch a big screen. Oasis recently played MetLife Stadium in NJ, where the local football teams the Jets & Giants play (the NY Jets & Giants that have their “home field” in NJ, lol…but I digress; & let’s not even talk about sports event ticket price$) & I briefly considered but decided against it. I saw them back in the day in their prime at a theater in NYC w/ the Black Crowes, the brotherly love tour, and couldn’t believe now they sold out 2 nights in a football stadium.
And I’ll add another slap in the face to us idiot concert goers, the smaller shows here in NYC at local venues, where the balcony or side area used to be a 1st come, 1st grab situation, now it’s a MUCH higher ticket price. Even small places I guess have to try & suck out as much money as possible from every single patron. It’s a tough, shitty situation…but we love the bands, we love the music & going to a live music show is one of the best things in life & can fill a heart & soul with such good energy so we can deal w/ all of life’s bs for another few weeks til the next recharge…
One more quick note, Geoff Tate of Queensryche recently played a theater in NJ where he did Mindcrime in it’s entirety. He sold out the venue which was kinda surprising. But a big key to him selling it out was that tickets were a mere $40 each. Lesser known bands or “tribute” bands play this same venue and the usual ticket price is generally $75 and up. His concert was up for sale almost a year in advance so I wonder if scheduling so early enabled the artist/venue to keep ticket price$ at a more reasonable price & thus a sold out show was reached? Great article Mr Destroyer, depressing but on f’ing point!
Absolutely — that’s exactly it. That recharge is everything. I’m actually planning a road trip down to Canberra (three hours away) to see Machine Head in a small venue. I could’ve gone to the Sydney show—it’s only an hour away—but it’s outdoors, and I’d rather feel that raw energy up close, indoors, where it’s loud, dark, and personal. That’s the kind of show that really fills the tank.
Also want to add that Geoff Tate is showing everyone how it’s done. Price it fair, plan it early, and trust the fans to show up. Forty bucks for Mindcrime in full? That’s how you build loyalty, not squeeze it dry.
In case anyone might be interested I’ll be doing my radio show tmw, Monday from 12 Noon til at least 5:00 here on local non-profit cyber radio station, MakerParkRadio.NYC. DJ Bubba Guitar – “Spanning Time”, smorgasbord of music: New & old, hard & soft, Rock/funk/punk/soul, Xmas tidings and 2025 songs. My usual total mish-mosh, lol…
Can listen via the website, or download the free Makerparkradio app or thru smart speaker etc etc…Thx, take care all, have a great week.
Bubba
I checked out World Cup tickets since there will be matches a few hours away from me. The cheapest ticket was $325. I also checked out the new Rush shows. The cheapest ticket was about the same. Your analogy of the velvet rope and an airport lounge is spot on – it’s all about the aura of the event and the bling of shelling out to attend it. I can find better things to do with my money and time than to spend that much to see something that cost me several times less not even all that long ago.
Totally get that. I had the same moment of disbelief with the Qatar World Cup. I actually scored tickets for all three of Australia’s group games, plus the Round of 16 and Quarter Final — dream setup. Then the accommodation quotes came in: anywhere from $32K to $70K. The options were literally stay in Saudi and fly in each day, or stay in Dubai and commute across the Gulf. Like, WTF? That’s not fandom, that’s financial punishment.
I sold the tickets, pocketed the money, and realized the “aura” they sell us isn’t the same as the experience we actually crave. I’d rather save it for a show or a road trip that actually means something.
I get that Rush is touring and can earn good coin but please stop punishing us.
Rapino is from Thunder Bay not that I know him and I have no idea when the last time he was back here. Maybe 1990 haha…
Today I grabbed two tickets to Maiden in Toronto next August. Now everybody has to live til than band and myself haha. I joined the fan club to get in on the presale and got lower level seats for a decent price. I tried for Rush tix but they were ridiculously priced…
Rapino will indeed keep cashing those nine figure checks while deke toils away in Thunder Bay.
Ha! So it’s Thunder Bay’s fault after all, that’s where it all began! Rapino leaves, builds a live music empire, and now we’re all out here mortgaging our futures for tour tickets.
But hey, I can’t even pretend I’m above it. I’ll still pay for Maiden, no question. Some bands are non-negotiable, they’re part of the life contract.