Concerts in the 80s

[billyboyz]

Just watching Billy Joel in concert on TV and remembering going to see him post A levels at the NEC in 1987. Happy times!
But I have zero recollection of how we bought tickets in those days. We lived miles from Birmingham so didn’t buy them at the venue. Obviously no internet etc. where could we have bought them?!
Just random Saturday night questions!

The ticket shop at hmv on New St in Birmingham had them, most towns and cities had a ticket agent eg in London there was Keith Prowse

Phoning or calling the venue, record shops

Bought my Glastonbury 89 tickets from the big record shop in Bristol (HMV I guess) for 25 quid each. Smaller scale gigs from Revolver on the Triangle (RIP).

My first concert would have been early 90s and although I lived in London, the tickets were always bought over the phone.

Andy's records or pay on the door, I saw so many bands just paying on the door, deciding to go on the day. Planning takes the fun out of it a bit. Not to mention the prices!

Picadilly box office in Manchester was always my go to in the 90s. Was inside Virgin Megastore I think.

Also Mean Middler had a ticket office which you could call for tickets.

"obviously he's cancelled" 🤔 - I am uncertain why the apparent cancellation of a concert by William Joel is 'obvious' 🤷🏾‍♀️

I lived going to the record shop to get them.

I seem to remember buying tickets at WHSmith.

It's one of the (many) ways that technology promised to make our lives simpler but actually has made it more complicated and expensive. Dynamic pricing is a complete racket.

You could buy them in big record shops (in Central London at least) or over the phone from agencies, for indie gigs smaller record shops would sell tickets or you'd just buy on the door - certainly that's what I did in the early 90s. I remember hanging on the phone to book tickets.

We had Selectadisc record store in Nottingham where you bought concert tickets for all sorts of places. I still remember going in and buying 4 x tickets for Glastonbury. £25 each. Those were the days.

I know it’s how it is, but the idea of waiting hours online to get tickets for these big gigs puts me right off and you know that people ‘ in the know ‘ will get them before the ordinary fans see a look in.
Look at the Oasis debacle, I bet many were disappointed not to purchase any tickets

I did read that Billy Joel is poorly. I hope people can get refunds without too much hassle.

I can't remember. Went to see Tears for Fears in 88 or 89. No idea how we got there or back either because we did hang around in the hope we'd see them afterwards!

NEC was the first arena outside London and had it's own box office. I would ring and order and receive the tickets by post. Went often enough I recognized the voices of the ticket sales. Could also go to venue and get them. Same when Sheffield Arena was built. Before that you went to the venue or phoned up or sent a cheque/po and a safe or went to a satellite ticket sales who had an allocation. Once TM and computerisation came along everything got monetised and went crazy.

Rhino records in Leeds was one broker. HMV would sell tickets or local theatre box offices. All took a small cut eg £1 and sent the allocation back if they hadn't sold all the tickets. Queued up overnight for Springsteen in 1981, Genesis mid 90s.

We went to see Olivia Newton John in the USA in 1983 (her Physical tour) and amazingly (now), didn't buy tickets in advance. Obviously it wasn't the only reason we went to US as we also wanted to sight-see etc., but we purposely chose the dates so that it coincided with her US tour. It never crossed our minds we'd not be able to get tickets. My memory is hazy now, but I think once we were over there, we just found ticket offices (for various things, not just pop concerts as they were everywhere!), and they'd tell us where to buy tickets for things if they didn't handle them, so eventually we found a ticket office with concert tickets and just bought them! Same with other things, like the Alcatraz tour in San Francisco where we just turned up that morning, bought tickets and went on the boat trip virtually straight away.

Same with UK concerts. We regularly went to our local University where "big" pop stars regularly played on their UK tours - again, we'd just turn up and pay on the night at the door!

There really wasn't all this having to plan ahead and buy in advance, and tickets were so much cheaper too!

Tickets weren't monetised in the way they are now. Concerts sold records, artists took a cut off records. Changed from 1981 when acts got wise about money and as the business changed so the prices went up

Bought tickets from the Apollo box-office in Manchester to see The Police in 1979. Saw Billie Joel on TV last night - he was great (at 75 yrs old).