Jack Antonoff Weighs in On the Problem With Dynamic Concert Ticket Pricing: ‘We Know Who’s Making It Impossible’
Written by djfrosty on February 7, 2023
With his second producer of the year non-classical trophy in hand after the 2023 Grammy Awards on Sunday (Feb. 5), Jack Antonoff took some time during his press chat after accepting to weigh in on the recent controversies around ballooning concert ticket prices and on-sale snafus for some of the industry’s biggest acts.
The producer-songwriter and frequent Taylor Swift collaborator made one thing perfectly clear during his chat with reporters on his feelings about mega-promoters: Them, they’re the problem, not us.
“The whole thing is incredibly tough. There’s no reason why … if I can go online and buy a car and have it delivered to my house, why can’t I buy a f–king ticket at the price that the artist wants it to be? So it’s that simple,” Antonoff said of the distress facing some fans when buying tickets to shows by their favorite acts.
“And you know the reason why. And it’s not ’cause of artists,” he added, without naming names of any industry ticketing agencies in particular. “So the one thing that I would say while holding a microphone is everybody’s got to chill on the artists. Because everyone’s trying to figure it out. We know who’s making it impossible.”
Antonoff, who has held forth on the topic of touring and dynamic ticket pricing before, said that he would like to see the industry allow artists to opt-out of the format that often results in sky-high prices for fans. He also stumped for the industry to stop “taxing merch” and allow artists to sell tickets at a “price they actually believe.”
In the wake of January’s contentious Senate Judiciary hearings on Ticketmaster, Ineffable Music Group announced a plan to cut merch fees for bands at its venues.
“Don’t turn a live show into a free market,” Antonoff said. “Because that’s really dirty. Charge what you think is fair … but if [for] one person $50 is nothing and for one person $50 is more than they can ever spend … you’re creating a situation where a different group of people can come together at one price. The second everything fluctuates is the second it goes K-shaped and turns into a weird free market is not what we do.”
Back in November, Antonoff tweeted out a similar complaint in which he blasted music venues for taking a cut of artist’s merch sales. “While we are having the discussion can venues simply stop taxing merch of artists? This is literally the only way you make money when you start out touring,” he wrote. “The more we make it tenable for young and small artists to make a living on the road the more great music we will get. Touring is one of the most honest ways to make a living. Some of the hardest and most heartfelt work you can do. So why must [they] f— artist[s] so hard?”
Antonoff added, “[Simple] solutions, stop taxing merch, stop lying to artists about costs of putting on shows, include artists in more areas of revenue. The stories I could tell from my years of touring are bananas. Young artists on tour are the last to see any money.”
Watch him discuss ticket pricing and merch in the Grammys press room below: