I've been to many Rolling Stones concerts. In fact, in 1978 I was at the Oakland Stadium for a "Day on the Green"--it was Mick Jagger's 35th birthday. Start me up, it was a great show particularly when "Honkey Tonk Woman" was accompanied by giant-sized woman dolls dropped down over the cavernous stadium by helicopters.
The Stones will play the Oracle Arena in Oakland Sunday but if you care to see them it will cost you a small fortune. The cheapest tickets, at $85 a pop, are sold out. Most of the tickets still available are almost $700, face value. Take a friend to the show and do the math. A plane ticket to Paris is cheaper.
SF Weekly, in a skewering open letter, take the Stones to task. It's pretty pointed, funny, and, if you're a normal human being, makes a lot of sense.
To wit:
We've always understood how you Rolling Stones were with your cash (we all know how you moved to France in the '70s because you didn't feel like paying high British taxes anymore) but you are all -- as you would say in your own country -- more than taking the piss at this point.
Your fortunes were made pre-downloading. You were making loads of money from music for decades before the shit hit the fan. You are all multi-millionaires, several times over because of it. So you can't use that as an excuse.
We also aren't particularly interested in hearing about how, because this is a shorter tour, you need to make money faster. How is your own unwillingness to do more dates the fault of the fans? Why should we have to pay more for you to do less?
Start me up...as I go to the ATM machine....because at the sound of tumbling dice...
*Follow me on Twitter and listen to me Monday-Friday from 1-4 PM PT on KSCO/KOMY.
