Count Kid Rock as one of the homies that hate Ticketmaster.
The ticketing giant has come under a lot of fire over the last year or so after botched onsales for major tours like Taylor Swift, Tyler Childers and Beyonce, with accusations that Ticketmaster and parent company Live Nation hold a monopoly in the entertainment industry that’s unreasonably increasing prices for fans.
The controversy over Ticketmaster’s fees and business practices led to executives being dragged in front of Congress last year for a contentious hearing that may have been the only time in recent memory that both Democrats and Republicans were truly united.
And count Kid Rock as someone who wants the government to do something about it.
During an appearance on This Past Weekend with Theo Von, ol’ Bob Ritchie discussed the problems with Ticketmaster – and as usual, he didn’t hold back.
Kid Rock said he’s even talked to some of the elected officials in Tennessee, like Governor Bill Lee and US Senators Marsha Blackburn and Bill Hagerty, about passing legislation to reign in Ticketmaster:
“I’ve actually talked to several of them about really taking a hard look at Ticketmaster. They have a monopoly. And even though I make a lot of money for them and I love the people at Live Nation – we’ve done great business together – I’m like, this is f*cked up.
I’ll be the first one to admit, I’m overpaid. There’s no reason to make this much money. But I can’t control it, because the market dictated, and Ticketmaster.”
He also pointed out a major problem with the ticket market, which is the reselling of tickets – something that Ticketmaster has learned to take advantage of, even though they claim to want to cut down on bots:
“They made over a billion dollars in the secondary market last year. That means if you buy a ticket and go to a concert, you’re their worst customer. They want that ticket to resell, and resell, and keep getting that money on it.
And they could cut it out but the government will not hold them responsible to stop the bots. The government says, ‘We’re going to do it,’ and they’re not doing sh*t. And these bots are out of hand.
I could charge so much less if I could get those tickets to people that want to come see me as fans, but when we’ve done it in the past, $20 tickets, we have to scalp our own tickets just to combat the real scalpers.
And I know people that do this that used to work at big banks, with Goldman Sachs, they do this full time and it’s nothing illegal. They go on…and they buy as many tickets as they can to like 10, 15 of the hottest shows in the world, and they just resell them for a markup.
And they’re making more money than they were being at a huge bank.”
Kid Rock even admits that his position on this issue is at odds with conservatives and the Republican party, where he generally favors the free market and deregulation over government intervention. But he says that it’s gotten to be such a problem that the government needs to step in:
“We need these politicians to change it, or they need to straighten up. Ticketmaster needs to do the right thing. Because they’re claiming it’s the right thing, this “verified fan” and all this sh*t, but guess what? The artist don’t get any of that. It’s f*cking highway robbery…
And Joe Biden’s out there talking about like, ‘Oh, we got it under control.’ All he did was make them print what the fee is. Not change it. No, you just gotta tell people where you’re f*cking them. All you gotta do is put that on there. It’s bananas.”
It’s nice to see more and more artists stepping up and speaking out against Ticketmaster’s insane business practices. But until our government actually does something about it, nothing’s going to change – and it’s the artists and fans who are going to continue to lose.
You can check out Kid Rock’s entire conversation with Theo here:
