Bruce Springsteen might have broken the law by holding back too many tickets

Linda · **Posted:** Wed Jun 17, 2009 10:50 am

http://www.nme.com/news/bruce-springsteen/45417

Has Bruce Springsteen broken the law over ticket hold-back?

Jun 17, 2009

Bruce Springsteen may have broken the law by withholding 12 per cent of the seated tickets at a recent gig in New Jersey.

Of the 1,126 tickets in the four areas closest to the stage for the May 21 gig at the East Rutherford Izod Center, only 108 were on sale to the public.

This is because Springsteen requested that the rest be held back. Overall 2,262 tickets were saved for the band, record company and agent - coming to 12 per cent of the total amount of tickets available for the concert.

Approximately five per cent is the maximum percentage of tickets that are normally allowed to be held back according to state law. Because such a large amount of tickets were unavailable for public purchase, ticket prices for the rest of seats were driven up, reports NJ.com.

Organisers of the event have denied that what took place was unlawful, stating that the five per cent rule only applies to promoters and not the artists themselves or sponsors or the media.

Jamie McCrimmon · 28 Dec 2006

Legal or not, that's a total dick move. I wonder how common this sort of thing is?

Glenn S. · 30 Oct 2006

Between this type of thing and the ticket broker schemes, it's no wonder that the general public can't hope to get decent seats for a concert.

Invisible Pedestrian · **Joined:** 24 Sep 2006 **Posts:** 26163

This has been going on for years. When we used to camp out in the old days, we quickly became aware that most of the good seats were already gone before they went on sale because of radio stations, press, friends/hangers-on, label people, venue people, ticket brokers, etc.
Nice to see Bruce, who was SO upset with Ticketmaster once again being a total hypocrite. Between his mediocre album (I've listened to it further and it's really not good) and this crap, I'm losing respect rapidly. He's no different than anybody else-that's fine. But he acts like he's different and "for the common man" and it's been an act for years.

Jamie McCrimmon · 28 Dec 2006

Invisible Pedestrian wrote:

his mediocre album

You're a lot more generous than I am. It's not quite Human Touch/Lucky Town bad (although that's more down to a better group of backing musicians than superior songwriting), but it's closer to that nadir than anything else he's ever recorded.

AMW · **Joined:** 26 Sep 2006 **Posts:** 4543

Jamie McCrimmon wrote:

Invisible Pedestrian wrote:

his mediocre album

You're a lot more generous than I am. It's not quite Human Touch/Lucky Town bad (although that's more down to a better group of backing musicians than superior songwriting), but it's closer to that nadir than anything else he's ever recorded.

The word that keeps popping into my head to describe "Working On A Dream" (italics mine) is "embarassing"--Springsteen's "Barton Fink"-esque attempt to write songs "about the common man" with "that Bruce Springsteen feel". Worse than "Human Touch" (although I actually liked "Lucky Town").

JohnG · 03 Aug 2006

Lately I've been a bit turned off to Bruce and his never ending concerts. The guy seems to play around here every other month. And there's such a clamor in the Media about the tickets. I avoid it all.

I'll spend my money at Sir Paul's special event (the saver of CDs/DVDs).

Kid Bailey · 16 Jul 2006

I used to love Springsteen way, way back.
Somewhere around '85, '86, I started to not like him so much. Now, I can't stand to listen to him at all.
I've always thought something was not quite right or real. I think it had a lot to do with his association with Dave Marsh, who I thought used to be a great writer and turned into(or maybe always was) a complete asshole.

I'm sure, as has been stated, that he's not the only one who pulls this stuff, but I think it does make him less admirable than others that don't pretend to be things they are not.

Pip · **Joined:** 16 Aug 2004 **Posts:** 2921

I'm surprised such a law exists -- it sounds like a good idea, I just never heard of it. I imagine everybody in the band has a long list of folks they want to get good seats for a NJ gig and it would add up fast but closing out the public is bad form.

72stones · **Joined:** 12 Jul 2006 **Posts:** 2109

Check http://www.brucespringsteen.net/news/index.html for Jon Landau's explanation of things. Bruce Springsteen is from New Jersey. The bulk of the band has very strong New Jersey ties. The Springsteen organization and their family members all have very strong New Jersey ties. Is this really earthshaking news that this many tickets were held back? Bruce alone probably knows enough people to fill the arena for a night. It's New Jersey and not Portland, Oregon! Cut the guy some slack in this case. It says more about you guys than it does about him. If you want to get critical of somebody, get critical of the bands who withold tickets while playing in a smaller primary or even secondary market (non-New York or L.A. area), then privately allow the tickets to be resold by TicketMaster at higher prices in places where they don't have relatives and many friends at all. On this particular issue, I'll be critical of Bruce if he pulls this in a smaller market.

AMW · **Joined:** 26 Sep 2006 **Posts:** 4543

Quote:

"As our fans also know, we have kept all of our tickets under $100 and do all that we can to ensure that as many as possible are sold at face value."

God bless each and every one of us

Marcus · 27 Nov 2004

Bruce= Man of the People. :roll:

Bruce Springsteen might have broken the law by holding back too many tickets

Who is WANline