You’ve heard the stories: “Glastonbury sells out in 30 minutes”, “One Direction Tour sells out in minutes”.
Well, finally we have our own happy narrative and despite the corporate metal allegations, our band is way better than One Direction.
According to the grapevine, Metallica tickets went onsale at 10am this morning. At 10.06am, there weren’t any left. The likelihood is that there will be a few more tickets available sometime towards the end of the month, once the venue configuration has been worked out (and you can always become a Metallica International Fan club member, perhaps) but the reality is, we have our own arena show sellout measured in minutes, which is a massive leap forward.
Fans are generally quite slow to buy tickets here in China, due to the rarity of shows actually selling out, and the proliferation of tickets usually available on the night courtesy of the huangniu.
Shows selling out creates buzz, creates excitement, creates a very real reason to buy early. Once people start missing out on shows they actually wanted to see, it will encourage them to buy early. this will keep tickets out of the hands of the scalpers, and enable promoters to accurately gauge demand, and should make the art of selling shows a less haphazard one
All hail Metallica, all hail China’s metal fans