Even six songs into Radiohead's set on Saturday night the scalpers were charging $150 for tickets. So we ended up "watching" the show from the hill behind Berkeley's Greek Theatre with about 300+ other fans who couldn't get in. They sounded fantastic and I would have to say the experience was blissfully bittersweet. The view from inside (on Friday night) here. The setlist. Read it and weep:
01 Airbag
02 2+2=5
03 Where I End And You Begin
04 15 Step
05 Kid A
06 Dollars And Cents
07 Down Is The New Up
08 Nude
09 Paranoid Android
10 No Surprises
11 The Gloaming
12 All I Need
13 Climbing Up The Walls
14 Go Slowly
15 Myxomatosis
16 Bangers 'N Mash
17 How To Disappear Completely
Encore 1
18 Fake Plastic Trees
19 Arpeggi
20 Black Star
21 True Love Waits (Thom only on Rhodes, intro to EIIRP)
22 Everything In Its Right Place
Encore 2
23 Bodysnatchers
24 The Tourist
A sensible strategy! Now all you need is the world's largest periscope, clandestine wireless microphones piping the signal through a secure frequency and you won't need to pay the big bucks.
Posted by: ed | June 27, 2006 at 01:40 PM
The sound was actually pretty great, but I could've used the periscope for sure. Another option for the future: become friends with a security guard--although from the looks of it, most of the security guards were already in bed with the pirates... er, scalpers. I had no idea it was such a cutthroat business. Very eye opening!
Posted by: kim | June 27, 2006 at 02:10 PM
I used to know a guy in school who scalped tickets and he informed me that, like any good businessman, it was all about who you knew, rather than what you knew. Consider how low the guards are paid and how high the price tag for Thom Yorke's concert rider is and you have the inner workings of corruption. Of course, part of me wonders what would happen to corruption if the service sector were paid as lavishly as entertainers.
Posted by: ed | June 27, 2006 at 06:42 PM
So incredibly, incredibly bummed to have missed this show. I saw them the last time they came through at Shoreline and despite that place being the size of France, it was still a damn good show. Oh well, I'm sure bootlegs of the new stuff will come out soon like they did months before Amnesiac.
Posted by: Michael | June 28, 2006 at 04:04 PM