Pearl Jam just announced a tour in support of new music, as well as its partnership with ticketing giant Ticketmaster to sell seats through their SafeTix encrypted platform. However, when tickets went on sale, fans were furious with the band’s ticket lottery.
Fans who are a part of the band’s fanclub – dubbed 10 Club – had the chance to request tickets through January 15, prioritizing which shows they’d like to attend. On January 19, club members would receive a confirmation regarding their tickets. However, many fans were unaware that their 10 Club email needed to match their Ticketmaster email while registering. Although an announcement noted that both names needed to match, some fans ended up getting tickets despite using different emails, while others couldn’t score tickets at all.
In-between the mess, Ticketmaster issued a statement, writing that some 10 Club members should disregard an email telling them that they did not receive tickets.
ATTN @PearlJam Ten Club Members: if you received a ticket confirmation for @Enterprise_Cnt in St. Louis earlier today, please disregard the “unable to fulfill” email that was sent in error this evening. You are still confirmed for tickets and will receive them the week of Jan 27.
— Ticketmaster (@Ticketmaster) January 19, 2020
Some said that they hadn’t received an email if they won the lottery or not at all, questioning the lottery process entirely.
On Pearl Jam’s 10 Club discussion page, fans are blaming both the band’s fanclub and Ticketmaster for the mess. While many said that the information was easy to follow and there was “widespread user error,” others are calling out Ticketmaster, noting that there had been direct software issues due to high demand.
One fan, who has been a 10 Club member for six years, posted they they placed an order correctly, but was not confirmed for their #2 priority show, although other people were confirmed for their 5th and 8th priority.
“Many people who requested both LA and Oakland shows as their #1 and #2 priority had the exact same issue I did,” user DoDaFoo said. “We are not lying. TM (or more specifically Tickets Today) messed up the process for some shows. It’s obvious.”
Those who participated in the lottery also took to Twitter to express their frustration:
I’m not sure this @PearlJam 10 Club lottery worked very well. Tons of people got multiple shows, others completely shut out. I only put in for one show. Didn’t get it. Now to try to find tickets…
— Brandi M (@wpgjetsfan123) January 19, 2020
Pretty shitty considering I’ve been in the 10 Club since the 90s and I couldn’t get tickets for the tour. So much for the great new system we’ve got.
— Jared Delaney (@blackcrowe1027) January 19, 2020
@PearlJam remind me why I pay for 10 club and the supposed 99% chance I’d have to get tickets? Bc you said chances were 99% I didn’t bother with verified fan. Cant help but feel scammed.
— Dan L (@KnicksFanBlog) January 19, 2020
Not too fucking great to be in 10 Club 20 fucking years and be denied tickets to ANY ducking show.
— Paul Morgan (@morgjam) January 19, 2020
15 years as a 10 Club members, 20 concerts but not getting tickets pre-sale. #ticketmaster #PearlJam #dancewithdevil
— delayingok (@delayingok1) January 20, 2020
Horrible. My wife and I got ZERO tickets through 10 Club. No tickets, no xmas vinyl, no mag. Why do I keep doing this?
— Les Wilkinson (@LesWilkinson1) January 19, 2020
Not great @PearlJam. After 10 years in the ten club and never missing a tour/ten club tickets, you make the switch to @Ticketmaster ticketing and I’m told I didn’t get tickets…hmmmm, wonder if it’s a coincidence. Disaster. Can’t wait to see the fallout from this. https://t.co/FnhG3h1HEs
— Jonathan Romeo (@jromeo80) January 18, 2020
Pearl Jam recently revealed that they had put aside their shaky past with Ticketmaster to team up and battle the secondary market during their forthcoming tour.
“To give fans the best chance to buy tickets at face value for this tour, Pearl Jam has decided that tickets will be mobile only and strictly non-transferable,” a statement from the group read. “Ticket purchasers will be required to enter the venue with their guests. Ticketmaster SafeTix mobile tickets will be issued for all tickets for all shows and requires a smartphone to display.”
This took many fans by surprise, since the group took a stand against the ticketing giant and fought to end their monopoly in the ticket market and across the country back in the ’90s. The band even spoke before the U.S. Congress at the time, arguing that Ticketmaster kept adding high service feeds to their tickets. Now, it seems that their feud has died down, since the band noted that “no other tickets will be accepted for entry.”
While the fan club had the first shot at scoring tickets, seats will still be up-for-grabs this week. Fans who signed up through Ticketmaster’s Verified Fan program will have the chance to access presale tickets on January 23, followed by a general onsale January 24. Those who bought tickets but are unable to attend a show must sell their tickets through Ticketmaster’s Fan-to-Fan exchange, which will launch on February 18.
15 Comments
Comments are closed.
And the secondary market is the problem? Good luck to those didn’t get tickets. Now you won’t find any on either market. When are people going to learn. Pearl Jam and Ticketmaster don’t give a sh*t about you or your wallet. They care about THEIRS.
TM has always been, continues to be, and will always be the biggest rip off in the ticket biz. For decades and decades TM has always had one focus in mind!! MAKING MONEY, Not taking care of the fan. It even got worse when TM & LN merged. Now it’s just one Super Monopoly. Legislation has to be passed to make selling tickets on a even playing field.
This article gets it somewhat right. Members received a presale code and Ticketmaster recommended that fans also sign up for Verified Fan as a way to get tickets in case the lottery didn’t work. But VF can be just as bad because it’s the same problems as presale lotteries. PJ should’ve handled it the same way as U2, then there wouldn’t be so much of this no ticket drama.
Im sure stubb hub will plenty of awesome tickets to sell you for 10 times the face value.. Just found them laying around seems no one wanted them..
As a longtime 10c member this is the first tour where I lost one of the two shows I requested since they started the lottery system so I cant complain…I will, but I really shouldn’t. PS there’s a 2nd leg of the NA tour later this year, hope they figure it out!
Ok all you rich yuppie plastic surgery toting fools that have nothing better to do than travel around to ten or twelve shows….there are alot of us that didnt get a Christmas single n havent seen them in years n wont see them this time bc are actually what PEARL JAM SAID THEY WERE ABOUT the SMALL MAN WHO WORKS FOR A LIVING AND CANT AFFORD IT and all I hear you complain about is not getting the confirmation to ten different shows…..go think about that jerks
Gosh, and just think that the Department of Justice has conveniently allowed Ticketmaster and Live Nation to have what amounts to a virtual monopoly on concerts and ticket sales. Got a problem with that, suck it!
What’s with $105 per tix. Are you serious?
Seemed alot of stress and effort for basically no reward. How many pre pre pre pre sale hoops does a member have to jump through, only to find no joy. Shame.
Instructions were pretty simple people. Pre-register for the ticket lottery. Wait and see if you got the invite to the pre-sale from said lottery. If you were lucky and got the invite they you were to log in 10 minutes early before pre-sale. Get in the virtual ticket line then make you purchase when it was your turn. I got 4 nose bleeds to the St. Louis show. Several steps to follow, but simple ones..
And today the presale went live in Ticketmaster, and even with a code I waited in a “queue: for almost half an hour and there were, literally, only 8 options for seats, all behind the stage at MSG, and every-time you clicked on one (i tried them all) the message that “oops, other fan beat you to it” came off. Guess who is going to the “secondary market” now. Very disappointing.
I had the same problem Maria. Was 1550 in the queue. When I got a chance to buy after about fifteen minutes in the queue, many of the seats that showed up as “available” were taken by “another fan” by the time I clicked. This cost me about another ten minutes. Finally found seas up in the nosebleeds. Disappointing process, to be sure.
Keeping paying your 10C dues.
What a JOKE!!! I tried getting access to the normal fan sale and while it took 30 minutes to get into the queue, when I finally did, I’m still waiting for “tickets to become available”. And here I thought PJ was all about “the little man”–allowing easier access and inexpensive tickets. Nope. They are like any other business–they want their cake and eat it too! And Ticketmaster sucks! Good luck to any regular fan who would like to see them. No way to get tickets now. They should be ashamed of themselves conducting a ticket sale this way.
So I went down to Gila River Arena box office, Glendale Az this morning to purchase 2 tickets to see Pearl Jam for my first time and was told that they could only be purchased online. It was a nice drive down there to the box office so wasn’t to upset…. Got home to check online and buy 2 tickets only for Ticketmaster to say, sorry these tickets went fast, check back for updates! So the “little man”, or in my case, the “little woman” never ever even had a chance to buy 2 tickets, or even 1 if I could… Seems that being just a simple person trying to go see a band is not possible! Would have loved to go see them…
Fuck it. What a waste of two hours. Got licked off after waiting so long. This sucks huge @@@