Fleetwood Mac was one of the biggest concert draws in 1979. In November they sold out two shows at The Checkerdome. After waiting several hours at a Peaches in Florissant, I found that the premium seats were gone for the first show. I managed to get 30th row, hardly what you would call a choice seat. A few weeks before the show, I came by a person who had a single seat on the end of the 8th row. I snapped it up thinking that at least my date and I could trade seats every once in a while. I like everyone else who attended rock concerts was always looking for any method to get a better seat.
Shortly before the show, I seized upon an idea that was so simple that I could not believe it hadn’t been done before. Rather than trading seats with my date, what if I could get a seat added to the 8th row? Here is how it worked:
Both my date and I used the 30th row tickets to gain admittance to The Checkerdome. With the 8th row ticket, I tore it in three pieces. After we got on the floor, we headed down to the 8th row. We stood there at the seat and motioned for an usher. “Look here, we have an apparent misprint. We bought two tickets, but they are for the SAME SEAT,” I said with a confused look. They got on their walkie talkie and called the management. From there we were ushered to the management office at the venue. (This was probably the same office they put me in for selling illegal shirts earlier in the year. I shouldn’t have been arrested. The shirts looked so bad, I didn’t sell any). Anyway, some woman came out and asked, “what’s the problem?” I told her my two tickets were for the same seat. She eyed me closer and asked for the ticket stubs and disappeared. About ten minutes later, she comes back and says. “This has never happened before. I know this is one ticket. But I can’t prove it.” I faced her and said with all the bluster I had, said “No it’s not. What are you gonna do about it?” So they added a seat on the end of the aisle. It was magnificent. And so that night’s attendance went up by one.
Do you have a concert story where you managed to get a better seat in a devious way? Feel free to reply with it!
Ingenious and hilarious!
I bought the book during the Vintage Vinyl signing and am really enjoying it. Although I was around back in the early days and heard KSHE occasionally at friends’ houses, I didn’t have an FM radio, so I didn’t start listening to the station regularly until I returned from college in 1977. I found plenty to enjoy from that point on, but after reading your book, I really wish that I had been listening sooner as well!
Anyway, great job on the book! (I couldn’t find any other place to leave you feedback, so I figured that this was as good as any.)