The tickets don't lie—Gaga's fading

CNBC posted a video today with Chris Tsakalakis, the president of StubHub. For all those who don't know, StubHub is an online marketplace owned by eBay which provides services for buyers and sellers of tickets for sporting events, concerts, theatre, and other live entertainment. It has grown from the largest secondary-market ticket marketplace in the United States into the world's largest ticket marketplace.

What is a secondary-market ticket marketplace? Essentially people can buy tickets from official sources like Ticketmaster, and then resell them on StubHub. Sometimes people sell their ticket to a show if they can't go, but many others make a business out of it by scooping up as many tickets as possible for an event that is in high demand, and then reselling the tickets at a marked up price and keeping the difference.

When an act is very popular, tickets can sell on StubHub for twice, three times, even four times or more of the face value of the ticket. For example, Lana Del Rey's tour sold out in seconds, and tickets were appearing on StubHub for $700 or more.

As I stated in this article, resellers have been unable to sell Gaga's tickets, even when they are set at ridiculously low prices. The interview with Chris Tsakalakis has confirmed that what I said in that article was true. The demand for tickets is just not there, as tickets for Gaga's current tour have not even broken into the top-10 list of StubHub's most popular events.

He is quoted as saying: "One Direction is still in the top 10 for concerts on StubHub but Lady Gaga is not, and that's a little bit surprising this year. Even though she's touring and generally doing a lot of concerts she's not in our top 10 this year."

It's also worth mentioning that tour executives have denied reports that tickets were not selling well. Live Nation's Arthur Fogel told Billboard in late March that ticket sales were already at 80 percent of capacity at that time, with $26 million in gross revenue to date.

Of course this may be true if they're going by official numbers. But if people are buying out sections of the show for the sole purpose of reselling the tickets secondhand, then it's not really representative of actual demand or audience size. Kind of like when Gaga goads fans into buying multiple copies of her records.

                                  

Tonight Gaga is playing in Seattle, WA. The lowest price as of now is $38.05 on StubHub.

Ticketmaster still has plenty of tickets still available officially, though.

STORY SOURCE HERE

Thanks to all those that posted the link in the comments.

 

UPDATE:

Looks like she won't have to worry about selling those tickets after all.

 

 

 

Is there no room for soul in pop music?

"When you raise the bar so high so soon, you’re going to get stuck up there – until you fall. This will now be known as the “Lady Gaga Dilemma,” because her artRAVE: The ARTpop tour that came to Rexall Place on Monday night was even more garish and over-the-top than last time she was here.

If such a thing can be imagined.

At this rate, it’ll take a building twice the size just to hold her ego, let alone another bombastic Broadway-style pop spectacular to go with whatever concept album she comes up with next. Sooner or later, the Cirque du (Insert Artist Name Here) thing that’s infected the modern concert industry is going to get too huge for its own good. If it hasn’t happened already. There is so much production, so much going on, so many high expectations and so much money riding on the whole thing - because tours are now the primary income source for most recording artists - that there’s little room for honest moments where the artist can just be a human being. There’s no room for soul. Perish the thought of any sort of spontaneity creeping in. Occupational hazard when an artist becomes a “brand.”

One precious genuine moment stood out for Lady Gaga amongst a relentless and predictable riot of weird-for-its-own-sake sight and sound and one throbbing dance beat after another. It was Born This Way, conceived and adopted as an empowerment anthem for the gay community, and recast as a slow piano ballad – solo. Gaga did a beautiful job, and no one seemed to mind that the original dance arrangement had been gassed. Quite the contrary."

"So why did it seem like she was trying to prove something? Is she really this insecure despite such obvious gifts?

Between the proclamations of how “beautiful” everything was – the arena, the people, pretty much everything – and the pre-programmed, strictly choreographed songs that bulked the show, Lady Gaga tried too hard."


Read the rest of the review HERE.


The Sun provides the same old story as every other review we've seen so far of the artRAVE: that Starlight is terrible, and that Gaga should just sit her ass down and sing because that's what she's good at.

But we already all knew that.

I thought we could switch gears for a second and focus on something else. 

The writer stated: "...[For most recording artists] there’s little room for honest moments where the artist can just be a human being. There’s no room for soul. Perish the thought of any sort of spontaneity creeping in."

What do you think? Do you agree that there's no room for soul in a touring pop act? 

Or is that just the writer's way of justifying Lady Gaga's sorry excuse for a show?

Lady Gaga lacks Show-manship

The Calgary Herald gives Gaga a worse review than Rolling Stone!
      

"A Show.

To a person, that’s how every single person who greeted the news you were on your way to see Lady Gaga’s Sunday night performance at the Saddledome described it.

“Should be a great/good Show.”

Not a concert. A capital “s” Show.

The distinction is an important one, and one that we’ll get to later. Because it’s also necessary to note that half, if not more, of those who greeted that news of the Gaga Dome date were also entirely unaware that the star was even in town.

That is a testament to how far she’s fallen off the pop culture and pop music radar in the past two years. It’s as if she’s used up her Warholian allotted 15 minutes of fame in record time, a victim of the very thing culture she attempted to manipulate and harness, one that’s accelerating at a pace that even a professional, master manipulator couldn’t predict or expect.

And Gaga’s Show Sunday night at the Saddledome, which was part of her artRAVE: The ARTpop tour, was an extension of that. It seemed like a joyless and desperate attempt to hold on. And to catch up. A Show that was targeted at one narrow audience, and would have closed after opening night were it a Broadway or off-Broadway endeavour.

Unfocussed, horribly paced, haphazardly staged, an obscene neon-coloured visual mess, the Show was a disappointment of almost every level.

She took the stage — a semi-interesting, Seussian, marshmallow-like concoction that weakly echoed Katy Perry’s Candyland set — and performed, with dancers, a seemingly disinterested choreographic effort to the title track from her current endeavour and tour.

It wasn’t a Show-stopper, nor a Show-starter, merely a number unconnected to anything, let alone the audience of (insert eyeroll) Little Monsters.

The rest of the evening featured the same, songs such as G.U.Y., Venus, the watered-down Madonna track Paparazzi (ironic subject for someone whose entire career has been fed by that, yet also someone who wouldn’t even allow photogs into her show), a terrible take on Poker Face, Do What U Want, Sexxx Dreams, Mary Jane Holland and Bad Romance, which were accompanied by dancers either prancing Glee-like or holding balloons, a light show that was bright and nothing more, an endless stream of confetti, and a band that was so nondescript as to be unnecessary.

Of course there were costume changes, but nothing that was protein-related or notable.

And when it came time to step out of the Show, and attempt to speak to the crowd, her platitudes about “spirit,” “beauty,” “diversity,” “love,” “breaking all the rules” and “risks” were so rote as to be insulting. She talked of “poets” and read a letter from a fan whose friend died of cancer and was inspired by Gaga — inviting the surviving fan backstage after the Show — but it was far too calculating to seem sincere.

Because that’s what she is and who she has been for her entire career."


READ MORE HERE --- Source: Calgary Herald


After that, the Herald discusses Hatsune Miku and Lady Starlight (spoiler alert: they're less than impressed).

With all these poor reviews, you'd think Gaga would have the sense to switch up her show a bit!

Tonight she plays at the Rexall Place in Edmonton, Alberta. Tickets are still available, so get yours now! 



....Yeah, or don't.


Update: Story has been moved here. Original story was at this link. 

Gaga proudly shares wildly inappropriate video on Twitter

Lady Gaga shared a remake of her Judas video on Twitter today. She encourages her 41.4 million Twitter followers and 65.5 million Facebook fans to watch it saying she LOVES it.

Link to Lady Gaga's Tweet HERE

What is there to love about it, Gaga?

The scenes where the children are using a gun as a prop?

Or the scenes where the children are simulating sexual acts, recreating things that were done in your video?

Really Gaga, tell us what it is about the video that you love!

While you're at it, why don't you remind us what the Born This Way Foundation is for?

UPDATE:

Gaga has removed the video from her Facebook, likely due to the thousands of horrified and disgusted comments from her fans regarding her praise of this video.

                                     

She'll likely remove the broken link from her Twitter soon.

What's the matter, Gaga? Can't handle a little backlash?

Did Gaga get a cool reception in Canada tonight?

Gaga made her way to Manitoba today for her first of 8 Canadian shows.

Unfortunately for her, it's not a sold out show. It's not like she's going to be playing to crickets or anything, but Ticketmaster still had tickets available right up until show time.

Here's a screenshot taken right before the show:

 

 

What's going on, Gaga? Why can't you sell out your shows anymore?

Maybe news of Gaga lip syncing her shows is catching up to the general public! According to the Star Tribune, she lip synced almost her entire (not sold out) show at the Xcel Energy Center in St. Paul Minnesota except an acoustic version of Born This Way which she dedicated to a fan.

Here's the quote from the article:

"Sitting at a keyboard surrounded by mock icicle-like stalagmites, she talked about a fan named Emma whom she met last year at her St. Paul concert. They bonded, Gaga explained, with Emma telling her she wasn’t famous anymore, but a friend. “Thank you for being my friend during my surgery,” Gaga said to Emma, who was sitting at the foot of the stage.

Gaga added that Emma has been in a wheelchair her whole life but has a better attitude than “99 percent of the people I know.” The famous star then dedicated “Born This Way” to her friend. And Gaga sang it like she meant, easily her best vocal of the night — especially since all her production/dancing numbers found her lip-syncing."

Source - Lady Gaga gets real with St. Paul crowd

         


Smart move on doing the interview where you bash other artists for lip syncing, Gaga! Now you're free from criticism! Because surely someone that bashes and judges other artists for lip syncing wouldn't dare to do it themselves, right?

Right?