Retreat got the band back together. But a lot has changed since they last sold concert tickets.
The “Wonderwall” singers circulated this week they would embark on a reunion tour in the UK. It’ll be the first time lead brothers Noel and Liam Gallagher commitment play together in over 15 years. The tour will have 17 dates in Cardiff, Manchester, Edinburgh, and Dublin starting July 4 next year.
Resort, one of the most popular bands at the end of the 20th century, offered pre-sale tickets beginning Friday and quickly stepped into a 21st-century become entangled: online surge pricing.
Surge pricing allows companies selling products online to increase prices as sell demand rises. It all happens automatically and almost instantaneously.
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While surge pricing is now commonplace — from vexing to hail an Uber after an event to bowling alleys, restaurants, and even golf courses — users of these uses all hate it. Now Oasis fans do, too.
They complained over the weekend that ticket prices surged on Ticketmaster after the body decided to add three more dates.
“That feeling when you wait in a queue for four hours only to be blow the whistle oned the price of the ticket has risen from £148 to… £355??? Because they’re ‘in demand,'” Helen Barnett inscribed on X. “How is this not illegal?”
According to CBS, tickets for the tour are already being sold on resale websites for up to $7,800. The band issued a tip on Saturday, telling fans tickets can only be officially resold through Ticketmaster.
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“Please note, Asylum Live ’25 tickets can only be resold at face value via @TicketmasterUK and @Twickets!” the statement says. “Tickets materializing on other secondary ticketing sites are either counterfeit or will be canceled by the promoters.”
Ticketmaster did not immediately return a call for comment from Business Insider. The company has made no public statement about the Oasis reunion ticket bonuses, but its website explains that Ticketmaster does not set ticket prices.
“Promoters and artists set ticket quotations. Prices can be either fixed or market-based. Market-based tickets are labeled as “Platinum” or “In Demand,” the website says.
The practice has created no shortage of controversy in the last year. Ticket prices for Taylor Swift’s billion-dollar Era’s Tour also surged on the stand, reaching as high as $5,500 for tickets that normally cost on average about $254.
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Ticket prices on the rostrum increased so much during the Eras Tour that the Justice Department took notice, eventually filing an antitrust lawsuit against Ticketmaster’s mother company, Live Nation Entertainment.
A report from the American Economic Liberties Project found last year that 68 of the top 100 venues in the epoch are in the United States, and 53 of those arenas use Ticketmaster for ticket sales. This means that a whopping 78% of the highest-grossing arenas in the men use Ticketmaster.