Don't F*ck It, You Muppet
Ticketmaster should have listened to Matty Healy...
Hi hi hi.
How’s everybody doing out there? This has been a WEEK for a lot of people. Things often get more chaotic at work as the holiday season revs up and all you want to do is…anything else. Harry got pegged in the eye with a Skittle on stage (and even Skittles tweeted about it). Twitter is apparently on full-on life support and basically has no engineers left.
Annnnnddddd, I have a stress fracture in the second metatarsal of my left foot. I am very prone to such things, but it’s been a minute. I may have pit danced too close to the sun and stood on said foot for multiple 13 hour days at the Children’s Museum. I regret nothing, though, aside from the fact that my high arches and the way my metatarsals lean is apparently a real problem.
My friend Heather said I’m like an athlete who needs rehab in the off-season and I like that a lot. I’ll be more than ready for my return to shows in January, never fear. In the meantime, this is the vibe over here.
Then, there’s everything that happened in the Swiftverse and the evils of Ticketmaster (which are apparently new to many people…where have y’all been?? No, but seriously. Have this many of my friends just not been to a show in 30 years?), which we’ll get to in a second. I did an early version of a rant on this week’s pod, but there have been some developments since then to discuss.
Also on the pod, there is talk of the new season of Grey’s (I like it!), the latest eps of The Crown (mehhhhhh!), the Jerry Falwell Jr. doc on Hulu (wacky!), EmRata + Pete (🙄🙄🙄), an ode to the great John Aniston/Victor Kiriakis, and more. (Coming soon, a very special soap operas episode with the Fug Girls!!!)
The Great War
First, I don’t want to repeat everything I said on the pod, but I also know that not everyone listens so…apologies to anyone who has gotten pieces of this ire there/on text/via DM/What’s App/in person, etc.
Second, I am so grateful to be going to this tour. I still can’t believe I got tickets. I know what it was like out there and I think any amount of anger and frustration (I have both…for all of us!) is real and valid. As you can imagine, SwifTok is in disarray. Let’s not turn on each other, people. Now is the time for all fandoms to come together once more against our common enemy: Ticketmaster/Live Nation.
Truly, nothing unites this messy nation of ours like a Ticketmaster disaster—and I think it’s fair to say this is perhaps the largest one to date. It’s certainly the most public, given the level of artist and the media/social media landscape we currently live in.
For those who don’t know, the pre-sale for Taylor’s Eras Tour was held on Tuesday and it was a shitshow of the most epic proportions. It was meant to be for fans who received codes, each mapped to a specific show. (Mine was Chicago 6/2. Bestie Allison got Nashville 5/7.) From the jump, you’re already dealing with a TON of fans who didn’t get codes. People got emails about “boosts”, be it because they had tickets for Loverfest, which was canceled because of the pandemic, or from buying merchandise, which is how I think I got mine. (I tried and failed to get Loverfest! I was planning to utilize the secondary market.)
This didn’t appear to “boost” you in the line, simply in getting a code—but many non-boosted folks got them too, as they should. I’ve also seen people lamenting that you didn’t need to enter the code to get in the queue, which is true. But if you weren’t coming in from the TM account that got the code, you were blocked. Now, could entering it twice have thwarted some bots? I don’t know. Maybe. But it isn’t true that any normal person could just could hop in the queues for a show.
TM said millions and millions of extra people were on the site, not necessarily in the queues (though likely trying to get in)—but also, why would any of us believe their statements or “data” at this point? Their platform, quite simply, doesn’t work. I get these same errors and disasters when I’m trying to get Kacey Musgraves or HAIM tickets. Listen, Kacey and my fave sisters from the Valley are popular and I love them very much—but they don’t have Taylor level fandom and the system can’t even work for their shows. With a code.
The not getting a code thing happens all the time to fans—and it doesn’t feel good. In many of my pep talks with distraught Swifties (and more casual fans who just want to go to a show/take their kids!), I reminded them that I didn’t get a single code for a Harry show myself and that I’ve seen 13 this year. I also didn’t get a code for any of the now-about-to-happen Adele shows—which is probably best for my bank account.
But, it still sucks.
Ostensibly, the Verified Fan program is Ticketmaster’s response to resellers flooding a sale with bots and buying up all the tickets. But it doesn’t work and has never worked. The bots still get in. Fans get fucked. Rinse and repeat. This happened on a MEGA level on Tuesday. TM’s shitty system broke in a matter of minutes—and they’ve had the nerve to call the demand “unprecedented”.
This was all anticipated. YOU GUYS HANDLED THE CODE REQUESTS AND THEN KNEW HOW MANY YOU SENT OUT!
Why no time slots? If you have codes broken out by particular show, why wasn’t this handled over a matter of days or weeks, show by show? Instead it was 10 AM local venue time for every market. Why can’t your system handle any sale that has even moderate interest, let alone this which you’ve known about at a corporate level for even longer than we have as fans/consumers? If you break this up over days, at least your platform likely doesn’t completely collapse in mere minutes.
Meanwhile, queues were paused for hours as we all stared at screens we couldn’t close out of that looked like this:
Sure, you could have just said BYEEEEE. But after you invest hours and hours, you need to see it through. At least I did. Also, I wanted to go to the fucking show. My tickets were purchased almost seven hours after I entered the waiting room for my sale (which was also glitchy when I first arrived) and after a million error messages. I took my open laptop into my car, hooked up to my iPhone’s hotspot, and drove it to the hair salon where I was eventually able to purchase tickets after I basically gave up and decided to just give it one more go.
I should have known after this was the only parking spot available.
It’s very normal for tickets to disappear from your cart after you select them and are told somebody got to them faster. Not fair, but totally normal as far as Ticketmaster is concerned. This is such a problem. We shouldn’t have to buy tickets this way, people!!!!!!!!!!!
This error was a new one for me. Well, my GD device was been fine for the SIX HOURS I was waiting and every other time I’ve purchased tickets on your site, you dumb dicks.
Again, many fandoms and fans have been screaming about the monopoly that is Ticketmaster/Live Nation for a long time. I mean, Pearl Jam in the ‘90s anyone? And Eddie et al were at the peak of the their powers when they were basically thwarted by being locked out of mainstream venues and the power of lobbyists in Washington.
This is essentially the same thing that is happening today, but made all the worse by the 2010 merger of Live Nation and Ticketmaster. The largest venue operator/owner and the largest ticketer became the same company. That fucked us all—including a lot of artists. It’s not the easiest thing in the world to overturn a massive corporate monopoly and people would do well to remember that when they get more angry at an artist than the real devil.
In a scramble, TM moved the west coast sales to 3 PM local time, where it wasn’t much better, and the Capital One presale to the following day, again at 2 PM local for every market. That was also a shitshow. I tried to get in get tickets for some friends and was unsuccessful. I actually don’t have any friends who got a ticket at that sale. Today was supposed to be the general sale, which is ALWAYS a nightmare, but TM just went out and canceled it yesterday. Chaos obviously ensued.
It’s unclear whether they truly don’t have many tickets left (there are ALWAYS some tickets, even for sold out shows) or if they just knew they couldn’t handle it. That’s another problem here, there appear to be no regulations and certainly no transparency with this business. It’s maddening.
I had to talk so many friends off the ledge—and I’m happy to continue to do so. (Do not, I repeat DO NOT, get upset and emotional and think you need to buy tickets at the insane prices on the secondary market right now. We’re gonna ride this out until closer to the shows, my people! I’m here to help!!)
Of course, the internet went nuts when the general sale was called off. Ticketmaster had this extremely bullshit blog post up that they have since deleted. It was filled with misdirection and outright lies, as far as I’m concerned. (Y’all, get a better crisis PR team. How do you not have a whole in-house department for that matter? You are never not fucking up.)
They tried to say that only 15% of people had errors and glitches (LOL, literally everyone did) and some nonsense stat that there are 90% less tickets on resale than usual, but like what do you even mean and when have you ever given data on that before/what are you comparing to? They also claimed they thought only 40% of people with codes would log on and then would only buy 2-3 tickets (limit was 6). That makes no sense for any fandom, let alone Taylor’s. She’s one of the biggest artists in the world and hasn’t toured since 2018.
WTF are you talking about, Ticketmaster? Don’t even get me started on dynamic pricing.
People are clamoring for Taylor to fix the system and I do absolutely think artists are important in making changes, but there are ways (some, not all!) that their hands are tied—and most of us don’t even understand much of how this works.
This heinous company is the problem, along with the lack of regulation and transparency. I cannot tell you how much more civilized it is to buy tickets in Europe. This is all very complicated and let’s please stop assuming that some youth (or elder) on TikTok or a stan account on Twitter is actually able to explain the intricacies of this business model to you—or knows what actually happened with the Taylor sales. None of us do. And we may never, even if there are government hearings I hope we have about this company eventually. Let’s remember our critical thinking skills, shall we?!?
I also find that so often it’s powerful female artists who certain segments of the public task with “fixing” broken systems like Ticketmaster or streaming music, etc. You hear it for Taylor, Adele, Beyoncé—but much less often for, say, Bruce Springsteen, an artist who also holds tremendous marketplace power. Where is this energy for The Boss? You hear it a little, but it’s much quieter.
Now, I didn’t love that Taylor posted about her Grammy noms in the middle of the hellish day that was the pre-sale and dropped another remix. It wasn’t her best look. (Though yay for her and Adele and B and H and all the other nominees!) I realize why she didn’t speak about this at first, too, though. It’s complicated because she’s not not complicit in some of these decisions (or at least profiting from them)…while also not being responsible for the massive failures of this evil monopoly of a corporation that is contractually tied to the venues she needs to play in.
Like, she can’t just go play a random theater somewhere and hope to satisfy the fans. People would be so angry. She’s trying to make her tour available to the largest number of people. Yes, that also makes her money. That’s how this all works.
It’s good to remember that Taylor is also not the only person who makes money from a tour of this magnitude—she hires A LOT of people. And, y’all, like it or not, we live in a capitalist society. You also have the absolute power to NOT buy multiple versions of her albums or merch or whatever. That’s on you. I bought one vinyl and some merch that I really wanted—and can afford. Basta.
This morning she released a statement on her IG Stories and I think it’s the best possible version of what she could say in this moment. I really like it. I can only imagine the highly tense conversations that have gone on over the past few days between her and execs at TM.
I do think she is very, very angry. And I love the bear attack comment. This absolutely sounds like Taylor and not like it’s been through 45 PR people (even if it was), which is highly unsurprising since she’s a fantastic writer and brilliant marketer. Of course, the haters came out immediately. That’s fine, everyone can have their opinions and she’s never going to be able to win with everyone. Nobody can, especially in the social media age.
This is not to say that people aren’t allowed to criticize their faves, you SHOULD. Putting people on an absolute pedestal is part of the problem in our world. Seriously, what more could she say at this point? And I bet she does build her own fucking ticketing system for next time. But, like, Taylor Swift isn’t going to take down Ticketmaster in three days time. Settle the fuck down.
As fans, people feel very connected to Taylor and she has built a career, in part, on those relationships. But she is also a business woman and fundamentally a business herself. There are a lot of layers here—but she, alone, cannot fix this and she, alone, did not cause this. Who wants to talk nuance on the internet, right? This is probably gets me most riled up as a Gen X fangirl.
But it is emotional and it is upsetting. I know this. Big feelings are like my whole entire vibe.
I’ve been saying for days, nay YEARS, that it’s gonna take government involvement to change anything with Ticketmaster. There is already movement, so let’s see if we can make this happen for reals this time.
In the meantime my Swifties and Swiftie-adjacent fans, let’s just chill for a minute and see how it goes. There are SO many shows and SO many seats and the prices will come down, even if not a single extra date is added…which is a thing that is possible. It’s all going to be okay and I’m pretty sure you’re going to see Taylor on the Eras Tour. I’ll be here to help whenever you need me.
This is my chosen role in life now lol. Come, take my fangirl hand…
I, I, I, I, I’m in Love with Youuuuuu
Speaking of fangirl life, back in 2013 I made an extremely concerted effort to NOT fall into the full-on spiral of Matty Healy/The 1975 fandom because I simply didn’t have the bandwidth.
I listened to the music (loved, obvs), paid a bit of attention to the culture around the band (especially as it related to people I was already in deep with like Taylor and to a lesser extent back then, One Direction)—but I kept it all at arm’s length because I knew what would happen.
Now in 2022, when I logistically have even less bandwidth fan-wise, I think I might be powerless to stop it. Damn it. I hate it. JK, I love it.
Matty Healy is so beautiful and insufferable and talented and fucked up and compelling and obnoxious. Yummmmmmm.
My friend Maura always says, “Matty is such a beautiful weirdo.” Yes, yes he is. I both want to punch him squarely in the face and do many other, um, things to him.
My FYP (that’s a For You Page on TikTok, you olds!) is slowly but surely being taken over with Matty clips and people talking about Matty/The 1975 and I am in that heady space of early spiral.
I know what this is, it’s what I tried to avoid on Tumblr back then. I’m just giving into it now though. This is all percolating currently thanks to a brilliant new album called Being Funny in a Foreign Language.
All their albums are excellent. Hard recommend if you’ve never dabbled.
This song, which they performed on Fallon, is on all the time over here. I love it so much—and yes it is where the title of today’s newsletter comes from. Jack Antonoff worked on this album and we know how I feel about his work. Plus, Phoebe Bridgers is in the actual MV.
Like, those knees? Those curls? Those expressive eyes and brows? The way his accent sometimes shines through even when he’s singing? Come. On. They’ve been using this living room set situation at their shows too. I love it. Even when he eats raw meat on stage. (It’s performance art, people. Feel free to dislike, but please know that there is a layer of irony and acting to it.)
Plus, Matty has long been one for wonderfully odd and perfect lyrical turns of phrase…it’s one of the reasons I always knew if I let myself, I’d be done for.
From this album alone, a small sampling:
“I’m feeling apathetic after scrolling through hell. I think I’ve got a boner but I can’t really tell and the fans are on…It’s cynical, this Adderall and vitriol, and young people drinking Aperol.” —“The 1975”
“My Mum’s not a fan of that line about her back, she said it makes her sound frumpy and old. I said WOMAN, YOU ARE SIXTY-FOUR YEARS OLD!” — “Wintering”
“I know some vaccinista tote bag chic baristas setting east of their communista keisters.” — ”Part of a Band”
Also from that song: “Am I ironically woke? The butt of my joke? Or am I just some post-coke, average, skinny bloke calling his ego imagination? I've not picked up that in a thousand four hundred days and nine hours and sixteen minutes, babe
it's kind of my daily iteration.”“I like socks with sandals, she's morе into scented candles. Oh, I'll nеver get that smell out of my bag. It was poorly handled. The day we both got canceled. Because I'm a racist and you're some kind of slag.” — ”When We Are Together”
And this is an all-timer for me, from “The Sound” on I Like It When You Sleep, for You Are So Beautiful yet So Unaware of It:
“A sycophantic, Socratic, prophetic junkie wannabe. And there’s so much skin to see – a simple Epicurean philosophy.”
See also, from “fallingforyou” on The 1975: “I don’t wanna be your friend/ I wanna kiss your neck.” Swooning for an emotionally fucked up dickhead? Sounds about right.
Stay tuned to this space as you can watch me devolve in real time—and be both proud of and annoyed with 2013 Abby for not allowing this to happen sooner.
Live Like You’re Dying
Will this be the last time I can embed tweets I liked here…who can say? Yes, I’m starting with my own. This is MY newsletter after all 😉
Oh, and…
There are so many good shows to watch over the holiday week. Dead to Me and Sex Lives of College Girls and Fleishman Is in Trouble are def at the top of my list … Owen Wilson is playing not Bob Ross, but totally Bob Ross, in a new movie … There’s already drama with the new cast of RHONY … I know it’s not an original thought, but I will stan Zoe Kravitz always and forever … I also love Gab Union (a fellow Scorpio sister) and cannot wait until The Perfect Find (based on my friend Tia’s fab novel) comes to Netflix … On BookTok’s racial bias … I love a good Prince George meets fashion anecdote, but I”m not sad I don’t have to write blog posts about them anymore.
Until next week, I hope you have a wonderful Thanksgiving, however you choose to spend it. Just know that I think going it alone with your TV and takeout is a stellar choice, and one that I’ve made before.
xA