So, the Country Music Association Awards ceremony is coming to New York in November. The event is usually held in Nashville, a perfectly reasonable place to hold an awards ceremony honoring the alleged best of country music, but the Country Music Association decided to break with tradition and give out the awards in a city that doesn't have a legitimate country music radio station. Good call.
But, whatever. I live close to New York, so I thought it was cool that the show was coming to the Big Apple. And I thought it was even cooler when I found out that it would be held on my birthday. Granted, I don't like a great deal of popular country music today, but I hold out hope for the genre as a whole. I want to believe. And I'm willing to sit through dozens and dozens of schlocky Kenny Chesney songs and Toby Keith's relentless odes to self in the hopes that somehow, someway, one good country song will make its way onto country radio. It's a tough fight, but I do love country music, so I'm in for the long haul. Just as long as Rascal Flatts only has, like, one more year of popularity. I'm just not sure how much more of them I can take.
Anyway, with the CMAs on my birthday and with a venue as big as Madison Square Garden to fill, I held out hope that the powers that be at the Country Music Association would make tickets available to the public. I've never really been to an awards show (well, I went to the New York Music Awards when I was little, but all I remember is that Full Force, Buster Poindexter, and The Real Roxanne were there...I don't even recall actual awards being given out), and with country music being a genre that prides itself on being fan-friendly, I figured the CMAs would be a good time.
So I've been checking the CMA website for info, and since today was the day nominees were announced, I figured information would be forthcoming. And, bang, there it was, a news item on tickets being made available to the public for the CMAs. There was a quote from Ed Benson, the CMA executive director, about how the association had been inundated by phone calls and e-mails asking how to get tickets to this event and how he was pleased that the fans would now have their chance to attend.
The next paragraph gave the details--the on-sale date, where you can get tickets, and so on. Then, there was the last sentence of the paragraph:
"The ticket price is $250 (not including tax and service charges)."
$250! For $250, I better get a lap dance from Miranda Lambert. And she sure as hell better put her knee into it.
I kept looking for the part where it said, "The entire price of your ticket will be going to hurricane relief" or something that would justify such a ridiculous amount of money. But there was nothing. Charging $250 was apparently yet another example of pure, unadulterated greed from an industry that goes out of its way to embrace fans, just so it can get a little closer to their wallets. I know it's not exclusive to country music, but there's just something about the Country Music Association--an association that purports to speak for a genre dedicated to common, everyday folk--charging such an exorbitant price for a seat that kinda makes me sick. And I'd like to believe that for $250, you're at least gonna get a good seat. But I ain't holding my breath.
Fifty bucks would be a good price, and I think I could handle it if they charged, say, $100. That, to me, sounds almost reasonable. $250 just sounds criminal. But it's indicative of country music today, where every other radio hit is a sappy treatise on being a dad, where Gretchen Wilson might be the only man left on country radio, and where fans are really just ATMs in carefully creased cowboy hats, spitting out money whenever asked.
Have fun at the Garden, kids. I'll be watching, as usual, on my TV, yelling periodically at the screen. It ain't much, but it's free.
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