“I was supposed to be in the video,” -Madison Beer.
That is me referring to Ariana Grande’s Sweetener World Tour. Ariana Grande has been a constant role model in my life, dating back to her days on Victorious. Unfortunately for me, I was an unemployed fifteen-year-old in high school, so I was not in attendance. Things are different now! So I thought.
On Tuesday, September 9th, pre-sale for the Eternal Sunshine tour opened for the queue at 10 am, and bullshit it was. As a responsible college student, I went to class and left the responsibility of getting tickets to my boyfriend. I emphasized how important this was to me, but whether he wanted to or not, getting tickets was highly unrealistic. Thousands of people were in line waiting for the limited Ariana tickets. What’s annoying about this is that Ticketmaster does not end the pre-sale after all the tickets are gone. My class ended, and I continued to wait. When I finally got in, all the tickets were gone. Tickets were sold to Radioheads, Ari-haters, and resellers. Tickets were priced up to $3,000 on websites like VividSeats and SeatGeek. The Arianators were mad.
On Wednesday, September 10th, at 10 am, general ticket sales opened. This time, I was not risking it. In the same class as the day before, I joined Ticketmaster on my phone, my best friend joined on her account, and my suitemate was on her account. If you’re going to war, you’re going to need an army. The queue opens, and my best friend gets 22nd in line. I ran out of class, facetiming her, trying to hold myself together. I was able to score two tickets in the 100s for less than $400.00 (Kind of crazy how that’s a good price). Those sections now retail for $700.00 for two tickets. I won!
Unfortunately, others cannot say the same. Yet, there is hope! Ariana addressed the ticket scamming happening this past week, saying she is working on both prices and accessibility so everyone has the chance to get tickets. Concert culture has gone off the rails, and Ariana’s devotion to these issues shows she’s not doing it for the money, and she truly cares about her fans. I hope for updates soon.