ACL Earlybird Tickets On Sale

There is not enough value for me in the $145 asking price. As ACL likes to say "it's less than $1 per band", but that experience is only worth $1. There are 8 stages going at one time, so you could only see each band for 1-2 songs, and you are very removed from the music with 20,000 people in between you and the stage, and sometimes you can't even hear the music, even for big acts like Willie Nelson or the Pixies, so it's not like you get the full experience of a real show, and that experience is only worth a buck.

I'm glad ACL is getting successful enough to charge more. It's their show they can charge whatever they want. At least they're gonna attract a bunch of out of town people and empty out their pockets and flood the Austin economy. But let's be real about it not being a good Festival. Remember, these are the people that gave you the Austin Dust Bowl. For the DVD they cut out some good performances because it was too expensive to digitally remove the dirt clouds and all the people wearing dust masks or bandanas over their face.

The worst thing CSE does is lie about the capacity limit and load in way more people than stated. Some say it's done for tax purposes. An extra 10,000 passes over "claimed" capacity is 1.45 million in tax free money. I don't think they would be dumb enough to do this. Every year the news copters take aerial photos of the crowd. Professional census takers could prove the real crowds in court with these photos. So I don't think they would be dumb enough to do that. I think the overcrowding is a result of them hooking up every band, manager, record label, paper, and club in town with guest passes and plue ones. When they say capacity is 85k, they aren't telling you how many guest lists they give out. Last year the Yellow Rose girls were hooked up four black wristbands each (backstage/VIP access wristbands). I'm all for hooking up the locals, I wish this was even more of a local tradition than it is.

There are really two ACL festivals going on. The VIP Festival experience backstage for the festival producers, artists, club owners, Yellow Rose dancers, Radio DJS, Chronicle writers, and that one Statesman writer is a comfortable plush experience close to the music and artists. This is the festival experience that get's great press.

The other festival, the real festival, is the one that costs $145 and you watch music half a mile away from the stage in a living hell of a dustbowl. If CSE wants to make a truly great festival, the top two should stay front of house this year to get the real experience. They can't provide a good experience if they don't know what the experience is like.

I believe they maxed out at approx 60k last year.

I doubt that number will increase. They purposefully decreased the number in 2005 and 2006 after the 2004 show with the Pixies was absolutely absurd.

lineup comes out in mid may, maybe around the 15th.

The festival will absolutely be as crowded as last year - there's no way that they're only selling 40,000 tickets instead of 65-75,000.

But, since the organizers got over 90,000 replies to the $50 early bird "raffle" it's no shock whatsoever that ticket prices went up again.

Luckily I got in at the $120 level after refreshing the site about 15 times around 9:30am...

When does the lineup come out?

i think the scalpers continue to be more agressive as well. from their perspective, if it's a virtual certainty that you can buy the tix at $120 and sell them later (like now) for at least $140 or more, why not buy all you can.

i feel that the ACL organizers really try to do the best they can with ticket prices. i don't see them being greedy mofos trying to make more $$ off of everyone as much as they can. costs go up every year for fuel, utilities, food, water, etc but they seem to do a pretty good job of making things affordable as possible while trying to accomodate attendees' requests as much as possible (e.g., enhanced irrigation system to prevent the great dustbowl of '05).

besides, think about how the ticket price is compared to coachella. i'm actually going to coachella this year, and the ticket price was $285 per person. in the scope of things, the $120 i paid this morning was nothing compared to that. plus, getting around austin for a festival is WAY easier than getting around where coachella is.

last note: if you can't afford to go to a music festival, then don't go. don't sit there and complain. people like you make good targets for 18 wheelers. going to a festival is a privilege, not a right. enough with you whiners and your sense of entitlement. holy christ already.

Agreed completely, I just don't want to speculate that only a very small percentage were available at $120 with no basis.

That said, I think if the prices go up on tickets while:

a. number of actual tickets decline

b. ACL Fest continues to pump money into Zilker improvements (the water system, etc)

c. Food/beer prices remain stable

I'm not going to complain.

The reality is everyone in Austin benefits from a tax on the concert goers with the improvements to Zilker and I'm ok with that.

Stan, you're right. I don't know. But considering the cheapest tickets sold out in 24 hours last year and around 2 hours this year, is the festival really 12 times as popular this year or were there fewer cheaper tickets? I'll take back the "as fast as possible" part and say I'm concerned that their dicketry will get out of hand in the next few years. ACL is a fairly people-friendly festival. Let's hope this price increase doesn't extend too much to food/water/etc.

In 04 what was the standard price? I feel like I paid around $85-$100. 3 years later, the standard is $145. That's a big jump percentage-wise, similar to SXSW, which was 80 something when I went in the earlier 2000's up through 2004 compared to 130-160 now for a wristband. My only concern is will this increase happen every year? A big part of why ACL won their best festival award in 05 was the value.

Supply and demand is all fine and dandy, but if ACL makes x amount this year, then decides well, we'd like to make x+20% next year, we'll just charge 20% more and it will still sell out, they ARE doing smart business, but they're also being dicks.

Having said that, I'm with you on paying more to drop the 65,000 cap to say...40,000.

Don't stress, do you not remember the scalpers out front last yer riding around on bikes with dozens of 3-day passes in their hands just unloading them for $60 or what ever they could get. That was happening by Saturday at noon.

Em,

you cracked the case!! they *are* beavers!!

looks like booboo made a booboo...

maybe i need some glasses. or an imagination implant. ;)

I think those are supposed to be "eager beavers" but maybe I'm wrong...

Popular events sell out quickly. News at 10.

"dicketry" - that's just funny...

Bub,

Wait a sec.

Neither you, nor I, knows how many $120 tickets were available.

What percentage of tickets must be made available at $120 for it not to be "dicketry"?

The possibility of the event being uber popular has lead to the tickets selling way faster than expected, but I'm sure haters will assume only 19 individual 3 day passes were available at $120 to Louis Black and his friends, right?

i'm not sure why that image is confusing, since everbody knows just how much squirrels love music.

and that they carry dollar bills around.

acorns are for chumps.

I got mine for $120 at around 8:45. That's wild that they sold out the cheap tickets already. They're heading for the full on dicketry of SXSW as fast as possible.

I hope the total number of tickets was drastically reduced, not just the number of $120 tickets.

I'd pay $300 to avoid having to be around 20,000 extra people who just complain that it's too hot, too expensive, too dusty, too loud, etc.

of course the quantity was reduced! That's ridiculous.

I have no idea if the quantities were reduced. I was able to buy my ticket at $120 before 8 am.

They're already sold out of $120 tickets and have moved to $145. Anyone think the quantities were drastically reduced?