Has anyone ever headed to a sold out show for a band you really loved without tickets hoping someone would have extras? I never tried it, but tonight I did. Alice in Chains at the “Fillmore” Irving Plaza-it's a can't miss type of show. One of the best bands to ever be lumped into the pretend genre of grunge, playing right here in New York City. The tickets sold out in under 30 seconds for a CITI pre-sale so I had a feeling something was up. So Pam and I decide to head out there and try to find some extras, as I said before. I hadn't even made it there yet and Pamtexts me saying shes got someone for 70 a pop. I text back “70 eachhhhhhh?” I wasn't feeling it. And besides, as resident Jew in my circle of friends I think I should be there for all negotiations should I not? So I hop out of a cab-a near death experience on a whole other level-and it's time. Lets get to getting these tickets. The people scalping aren't usually right in front but down the block. Someone the light is always dim in the areas where scalping is going on, coincidence-maybe. So some shady looking character says he's got three tickets and can do $70 each. I said “Listen man I can't do 70-do me two for a hundred”. He looked tempted, then said he could only sell one ticket because he had a $300 sale coming through and backed out. So now we're walking across the street, we're looking for people who look like they may have extra tickets. So here comes $70 a pop guy crossing the street towards us and looks like he's ready to settle at my price. So we give him 100 bucks, and there we go. We have our tickets! And it was all a great night. The End.
Yea right. We head towards the door and I'm holding the tickets and out of curiosity I turn to some dude and showed him the ticket and posed the question: “How real does this look to you?” and he takes a look and replies with “Yea well, it looks real..really FAKE”. I should have known better then to get tickets from a sleazy scum looking hustler on the street probably sitting in a Harlem apartment shared by 43 other people counting my money-our money! He'll die slow of aids one day, what goes around comes around. Get to the door and the girl says “I'm sorry guys but you bought fake tickets”, which we already knew, and we exited the venue. Out quicker then we got in. All because I had to be stupid and make a not so wise, not rationally thought out decision.
So we hit a dive bar around the corner-I know it was a dive bar because a sign in the window said 'Dive Bar'. I thought the term meant a bar that nobody goes to, a dump. They advertise this? Anyway, walk in and they got the house music set to the Pixies-maybe the night's turning around. We sat and tried (at least I tried, Pam had to drive) to drown ourselves in our sea of sorrows(you love my puns). I down four Heineken's before I started singing along to “Winterlong”, the Pixies covering Neil Young. Great song. We got into a discussion about how we both wore punk based band tees to an Alice in Chains show(Pam-Social Distortion, Me-Black Flag). Then I headed outside for a cig and noticed they were setting up a barricade or something-and I see a bunch of people now standing around this bar with tickets in hand. I said to someone: “What they didn't go on yet?”. Oh they went on, I saw someone holding the set list. I wanted to cry when I saw the setlist. I ran in got Pam told her they're coming out and we're out there and Jerry comes out and signs like 2 autographs. Now, there's a lot of people there-but it's not exactly pandemonium out there. DuVall follows a little behind and signs one thing-someone bought Tripod(or the self-titled green record) on vinyl and he signed it then headed towards a cab. DuVall and Jerry two separate cabs.
Still standing around there's still about 15-20 people hanging and I'm wondering why. Then here comes Sean Kinney, the drummer. He's chatting, taking pics with people-totally cool. So when he got down to my end of the curb I howled out “Sean! I got ripped off for tickets-got them off some guy in street! Please sign my fake ticket!!" I'm not exactly a quiet guy, so all of that laughter was directed at my helpless screams for some redemption out of this night. Kinney stops, looks straight at me and says “man, that sucks” and carefully signed my fake ticket. Asked how much I paid and I said "Two for $100". I actually believe he genuinely felt bad for me. He gets in a cab, Pam had headed to the bathroom sometime between the time DuVall and Jerry came out to the time Kinney came out so when she emerged I said “Your night just got worse”-pulled out my ticket-”Sean Kinney came out and signed some stuff”.
So now I realize we're waiting for the bassist Mike Inez
. He came out and he was the most generous of them all, even Kinney who was extremely fan accessible. I gave him the same story and he was like “man that sucks.. I'm sorry about that”. He said sorry while I was posing in a pic with him that Pam was taking. Pam says its a bad shot, I think it's proof. And Inez signed my stub with a silver Uni so that fake ticket is at least worth a good memory now. One good memory from a night of nightmarish proportions.
. He came out and he was the most generous of them all, even Kinney who was extremely fan accessible. I gave him the same story and he was like “man that sucks.. I'm sorry about that”. He said sorry while I was posing in a pic with him that Pam was taking. Pam says its a bad shot, I think it's proof. And Inez signed my stub with a silver Uni so that fake ticket is at least worth a good memory now. One good memory from a night of nightmarish proportions. 