Right as Olivia Rodrigo’s new album GUTS dropped, a new tour was being highly anticipated. Dates were being teased at the pop-up shop in New York City, following the release of the GUTS album, so fans knew that the release day was coming closer and closer. Finally, on Sept. 15, just one week after the album was released, so were the tour dates. Rodrigo is coming back to DC, at Capital One Arena, which is different from her last tour which was hosted in theaters like The Anthem. Even though the venues got larger, the tickets to attend the tour were still difficult to claim. Just like for her Sour Tour, a lot of fans had complications with Ticketmaster’s Verified Fan process, and many didn’t get tickets because of it.
The GUTS tour ticket buying process is being compared to Rodrigo’s last tour, as well as Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour, as getting tickets was a struggle. The Sour Tour was hosted in smaller venues, even though the success Rodrigo had back then was immense. With the demand for tickets being high, the supply of tickets wasn’t, and with Ticketmaster’s horrible attempt of giving out tickets to true fans via the verified fan process, fans weren’t able to access tickets.
“I didn’t get a code at all…I didn’t even get an email telling me I’m on the waitlist,” sophomore Sasha Rotton said.
This situation sounds like deja vu to the Eras Tour, where fans couldn’t get tickets because of Ticketmaster crashing, and again because of the problematic verified fan process which was sent to more scalpers than fans. The verified fan process that ticketmaster utilizes with stars like Taylor Swift, Beyonce, and more recently Olivia Rodrigo, has been causing some controversy because of how randomized it is. Instead of getting true and real fans tickets by looking at spotify streams or other ways, a randomized process is being used which gets tickets into the hands of scalpers. It was no different with this tour, with a majority of true diehard fans getting waitlisted whilst scalpers and bots got codes to the presale. Many fans didn’t even get an email until a day later, when the presale began.
“I applied for verified fan through two different emails and got waitlisted on both, then after the presale and initial sale passed, a few days later I got a text with a code for a sale of leftover tickets, which I was able to purchase.” sophomore Sadie Steenberge said.
Luckily, Rodrigo will be providing $20 platinum tickets, reserved for fans who haven’t been able to purchase tickets, which will be sold a couple of days before the concert at every venue’s box office. This is especially groundbreaking/innovative for an artist as big as Rodrigo, which is something that more artists might take note of.
Putting aside the problems that Ticketmaster has created surrounding this tour, it will be very interesting to see what Rodrigo has up her sleeve. From the anticipation of what songs will be placed on the setlist, to if Rodrigo will follow in the footsteps of Taylor Swift and start having surprise songs at each date, it will be thrilling to see how this tour unfolds.
