Now I know most of you just come on here to download free albums, hey I know that's what i use most of the blogs i visit for, but every once in a while I like to have the odd rant. Today I feel like talking about gig tickets, not the extortionate prices we have to pay or even the ridiculous concept of booking fees and postage costs, instead I want to talk about the lost art of gig tickets, the actual physical ticket. When i first started to gigs way back in 1994 (Stone Temple Pilots in case you were wondering what my first gig was, what you weren't interested, well fine be like that), tickets used to be on thin paper and they would more often than not have the bands logo printed on them, they were something to look at and admire, now we are mainly given standard issue cardboard tickets, which have been simply printed to order. there is no love or craftsmanship or effort put in and quite frankly I miss this forgotten art. A gig should be an experience to be treasured and I must admit I find it a bit hard to look through my ticket collection with as much affection as I did in the past, standard issue ticketmaster pieces of cardboard are quite frankly dull and just serve to remind me that the industry has become so profit driven with little thought given to ward the customer and more on ways to make money for these faceless businesses who are purely in it for the money.
i know ticket companies are never going to go back to the good old days and I am going to have to stick with my bog standard cardboard tickets, perhaps the iPod generation are to blame, as these things tend not to matter as much to them, but hey I'm old School and I would like something pretty to look at, please tell me I'm not the only one?
Being a ludite, I know how lovely and visually stimulating it is to have a collection of such paraphernalia. I collect posters of the gigs now, as much as I can, though to be honest, I mostly have posters of the great gigs I never got to get to.
ReplyDeleteI am with you on the gig posters front, although I tend to find myself buying American gig posters as I can't find high quality gig art in Scotland. Having said that i do like the stuff that you do, I don't suppose you have any prints of Frightened Rabbit from last years Tramway gig? I remember talking to your brother(?) and asking him about it at the gig, but I must admit i was alittle bit tipsy/a babbling drunken idiot
ReplyDeleteWith you 100% on this Peenko, as you said the old tickets were thin bits of paper and they varied from gig to gig in colour, size and the bands logo. Now all you get is a piece of cardboard that has no character and does nothing to make the memories of the gig come flooding back when you look at it a few months or years later. I wouldn't mind paying the unjustified booking fee if I could choose to have a traditional ticket. Bring back the Art and Soul!!!
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