Arts writer Derek McArthur looks at Bruce Springsteen's decision to sign off on exorbitant ticket prices and why the practice of premium seats is damaging to an already damaged corporate live music industry.

If there’s a hill I’m willing to die on, to the sounds of a few smears and jeers, surprisingly, it’s that live music is a complete and utter rip-off.

I’m not talking about the small gigs that have had to up their entry price from £5 to £10. Those performances are put on for the love of the game in a declining economy. I’m talking about going to see acts where you pay out the nose for the privilege of seemingly knowing their name.

Everyone who is anyone is in on this apparently acceptable grift where £100 tickets have become the norm. We’re so used to weird post-modern terms like Live Nation and Ticketmaster that we don’t even question how obsequious and controlling they are in what we get to see, experience, and, to get closer to the why of it all, pay.

Because the troubling truth is, they can charge whatever the hell they want. Ticketmaster alone is used by 60% of ticket buyers in the UK and controls more than 70% of the US market. Dynamic pricing, now a standard practice, makes it so ticket prices increase based on........

© Herald Scotland