I paid more than £100 for a stadium gig and felt like a mug afterwards

The Herald Scotland

16-07-2025

Even so, letting market forces push ticket prices ever higher is a risky business. What if fans feel ripped off and make up their minds never to see you again? Artists and promoters started it, but fans are now making equally ruthless economic judgments about their idols.
The legend is that in the world of big live events, everyone's a winner – fans get to see their rock gods in person and artists get to aspire to yacht-ownership. But the experience matters. When you've spent the cost of a replacement washing machine on two concert tickets, the artist is the size of a fruit fly on a faraway stage and the set list is a bit 'meh', dissatisfaction – the enemy of future ticket sales – sets in.
Read more Rebecca McQuillan
The very least people expect is for bands to stay on stage for longer than they queued to get in. The rapper Drake upset audience members last weekend at London's Wireless Festival by playing for only 40 minutes on the last of his three nights. 'Short-changed' and 'daylight robbery' were two fan reactions.
At Lana del Rey's Hampden gig last month, fans paying over £100 a ticket (me included) were hoping for more – about an hour more in fact.
When she still hadn't turned up at 9.05pm, long after support act Banks had gone, a slow handclap began. How much time did she think we needed to take narcissistic selfies?
Around 10 minutes later she finally drifted on (Lana doesn't dance) and there was a roar of excitement from an audience made up largely of young women. But it felt like she'd barely gotten into the swing when she was winding things up. Her set lasted a little less than 90 minutes, featured three unreleased songs and two covers, and the sound quality was ropey, particularly when she spoke to the crowd. (Taylor Swift and Bruce Springsteen famously play for over three hours.) It just didn't feel like a fair deal, but it was too late. Gimme them gold coins, gimme them coins.
Ticket costs are rising still. Pent-up demand after 2020 explains some of the increase and inflation has also pushed up promoters' overheads, but big-name artists also see touring as a way to make big money since streaming took over from CDs and vinyl.
Oasis play Murrayfield next month (Image: PA) Are we mugs for paying the prices? It's an argument, but the end of a Ticketmaster queue is where perspective goes to die. People invest in the event before even spending anything, just by sitting in the queue. When they reach the end to find the cheaper tickets gone, a fevered re-evaluation takes place against the clock and tickets are panic purchased for sums that were never in the budget. It's like that by design.
In fairness to artists, really huge ticket prices are the reserve of relatively few big names, while smaller acts playing smaller venues have a much tougher time making profits. And the industry did need a boost after the pandemic. But fans often smell greed, especially with arena and stadium gigs. 'It's gross when grassroots music is struggling so much and big artists charge that much money when they don't even need to,' says one young fan.
Parents are unimpressed at the prices charged by artists with large teenage followings and frustrated by how divisive it can be. One mum I spoke to described her daughter's dread going into school the Monday after Harry Styles played Murrayfield, knowing that some of her classmates had been there when she hadn't.
Additional costs add to the overall outlay. There's the water they make you pay for because you can't take in your own, the travel and sometimes the accommodation.
Lots of concert tickets are still being sold, but some fans are not prepared to play ball any more. There are signs audiences are changing as younger and less well-off music fans are priced out or getting fed up and staying away. In 2022, 51 per cent of people told You Gov they'd been priced out of a gig at least once in the previous five years and 18 per cent said it happened frequently. While young adults are still the mainstay of audiences, the proportion of middle-aged and older people is growing.
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Fans are discerning and if they turn their backs on acts or set a limit on their ticket spend following disappointing experiences, the artist, venue, ticketing platform and promoter miss out on repeat business.
'I paid £200+ for two different concerts recently. One was worth it easily, the other wasn't. I also paid £30 for a gig for a less popular band that was the best value of the lot,' says one music fan.
'I only pay up to £80 and then only for 'big' performers,' says another.
If prices keep swelling, stadium gigs are going to be made up of grey heads and empty seats. Some already are. Artists that under-deliver are making matters worse.
Leave them wanting more, not their money back.
Rebecca McQuillan is a journalist specialising in politics and Scottish affairs. She can be found on Bluesky at @becmcq.bsky.social and on X at @BecMcQ