Bob Dylan 990726 in New York City (Tramps)
Getting the tickets: "The 900 tickets to the concert at Tramps at 51 W. 21st Street in New York City go on sale at the box office Wednesday at noon. At 11AM on Wed., they are going to hand out wristbands to the first 200 people in line. There is a 4 ticket per person limit." Subject: Tramps Review From: Scott M milliken@nji.com Date: Wed, 21 Jul 1999 04:45:47 GMT Tickets were supposed to go on sale at noon 7/21. Arrived at 7:30am and waited on line until 12:00pm. NO TICKETS. The manager at tramps (Unexperienced in management) decided to start selling tickets at 1:30am the previous night and sold 600 tickets leaving only 200 left for the 21st. Sclapers were everywhere and offered me a ticket for $250! Finally the manager (from a suggestion from one of us) and well into the ticket selling process, asked the manager if everyone left on line buying tickets could buy only two instead of four. "What a great idea" she said, considering it was such a small venue and scalpers were buying up all of the tickets Duh@! This made room for approx. 25 more people getting tickets. Too little brain much too late. And what was the idea of giving out bracelets at the last minute. Needless to say I missed getting a ticket for the show by 5 spots on line. Tramps is obviously very inexperienced with such a big act. Should be a great show. Enjoy if you have tickets!
Subject: Re: Tramps Review From: Barclay Reynolds barclayr@chesco.com Date: Thu, 22 Jul 1999 06:53:16 GMT Scott - at 1:30a there was some where in the vicinity of 150 - 175 people already in line to buy tickets. All of us in line were prepared to make the eleven or twelve hour wait necessary to buy tickets at the appointed hour of 12 noon. There were chairs, milk crates, blankets, foam pads and sleeping bags evident everywhere in the crowded street scene. The people at Tramps where in the position of waiting eleven hours to start ticket sales with an ever growing mass of customers ready to buy tickets - with all the potential problems a wait that long on a New York City str. might cause to both the club and to those in line - so they wisely choose to start the ticket sales early. Now they could have waited. And all of us in line could have waited there all night and when you arrived at 7:30a you could have gotten in line. But we would have been there and you still would not have gotten any tickets. At the rate of four tickets per person only the first 250 or so people in line had any chance of getting tickets and at the rate that people were arriving the magic 250 number was going to be reached long before 7:30a. At least Tramps held some of the tickets for later in the morning and I'm sorry to hear that you failed to get a ticket, but no matter when the sales had begun you would have failed. Tramps acted responsibly in looking out for their own ass and the ticket buyers who arrived early. Barclay
Date: Thu, 22 Jul 1999 12:27:48 -0500 To: karlerik@monet.no From: Aaron White aaron@mail.page-a-day.com Subject: TRACKS Fiasco (unchecked for errors) KEA, I just wanted to provide a brief report on the hellacious ticket scandal crisis that broke out yesterday on 21st St. outside Tramps nightclub. As was reported accurately on your website, Tramps management had said that wristbands would be distributed to the first 200 bobcats in line, with a 4 tx limit per person. I got to Tramps around 7:00 am on Wednesday morning. I was quite relieved when I turned the corner of 6th Avenue and saw a line, but a relatively short one, gathered on the street. I roughly counted heads as I walked down the line (hop dog happy ike a young Johnny Cash) and came up with a number close to 100. I was very pleased with this equation and cheerfully took my place at the back of the line, but disaster was imminent. About 30 minutes after arriving, with about another 70-some-odd people showing up hence, an awful rumor (if a rumor is true, can it still be classified a rumor?) was "telephoned" down the line. It was believed that management actually had SOLD OUT all the tickets to the Bob show at 1:30am for god only knows what reason (indeed, we would find out later from some ditzy, blonde club-representative, that she just "had to"). Naturally, when i heard the news, I was shocked, disgusted, then angry, piss dog angry, and I was unwilling to accept this news as fact. To avoid a long discussion Tramps Nite Club for their breach of ticket policy, I will fast forward some 4 hours to 11:00. At 11:00, a brawny, muscular, thick-jawed bouncer type, walked up and down the line, and grunted and barked an indecipherable explanation of why tickets had already been sold, and said we should leave because there was NO WAY we were getting tickets. Thescene turned ugly in a hurry, and being very mindful and tasteful in my journalism, I shall not describe this moment, for it was a DYLAN wrath I would not have believed imaginable. 20 minutes later, the ditzy blonde arrived on the scene and attempted to console the masses by being unsatiably rude and downright childish. She claimed that she had sold 600 tickets the night before in order to get people off the streets or something, and that she "had to" do it. When asked why she didn't report to work earlier to tell the 400 some-odd Dylan fans gathered in the street (yes, traffic was frozen intermittenly throughout the day), she could not come up with a decent reply. But a ray of light soon broke through the abysmal darkness. Someone made the keen suggestion that Tracks reduce the ticket max. from 4 to 2, and, suprisingly this was accepted by the blond ditz, and out came the wristbands (neon pink and green for those collectors keeping score). Fortunately, but I say so sympathetically to those unfortunate souls gathered behind me, I was the eighth-to-last person to receive a ticket band. And then I paid for my ticket, and good god almighty, you KNOW I didn't complain. aaron
From: "Patton, Peter" ppatton@golinharris.com To: karlerik@monet.no Subject: Tramps Show Date: Fri, 23 Jul 1999 08:21:32 -0500 In regards to the Tramps show, I find it highly disturbing that the the ticket policy was changed near the time that the tickets went on sale. I find it equally disturbing that those who came waltzing in around 7:30 were able to have the same chance at tickets as those of us who were there at 4 in the morning. I ended up getting my two tickets, but I had a hard time expalining to the other two people who I promised tickets to that people in the back of the line were to busy whining all morning and finally wore down the management to change the ticket policy. To find out now that it was due to the incessant whining of those who were to be out of luck that changed the policy of four tickets to two makes me angry. I guess I can take solace in the fact that i have a ticket, sorry, two tickets and I was not the person who was fifth from the cutoff spot. Peter
From: "Cahill, Kyle" KCahill@golinharris.com To: karlerik@monet.no Subject: Tramps Tragedy? Date: Fri, 23 Jul 1999 08:28:58 -0500 For all those whining and complaining about how the situation was handled at Tramps on 21st in NYC on Wednesday, put away your hankerchiefs and start acting like adults. The decision to put tickets on sale at 1am by management while seeming to be backstabbing, had no effect on ticket availability the following morning. Use common sense. If they had held off, then the line at 8am would have been 400 people longer, not giving anyone a better chance at buying tickets. If they had announced the earlier on-sale time, then a line would have formed at noon on the 20th, again not providing any solution. Yes I did get two tickets after spending 8 hrs on line from 4:30 am until noon. And feel extremely lucky and thankful that I did. If Tramps had decided not to sell earlier in the morning, I would have gone home empty. Any person who thought they had a chance at getting tickets to this show at such an intimate setting showing up at 7:30am on Wednesday is clueless. They don't deserve tickets. I for one do feel slighted that a two ticket maximum was decided upon after immature and childish sniveling from people who realized that they screwed up and underestimated the number of true Dylan fans who would spend the entire night waiting for this opportunity. There were good friends and colleagues of mine who counted on these tickets who obviously now won't be there. I only pray that I don't have the unfortunate experience next Monday night of finding myself next to one of these fools and listening to them complain that Tramps sold too many tickets to tall men, need to install interactive video screens to accommodate those in the back, and should have handed out free donuts to all that glorious morning of July 21st. Kyle Cahill Golin/Harris International (212)- 697-9191 kcahill@golinharris.com
Date: Sat, 24 Jul 1999 13:57:19 -0400 From: david godlis god66@inch.com To: karlerik@monet.no Subject: Tramps One more report from the frontline at Tramps. I'm with Kyle Cahill. Got two tix and consider myself extremely lucky. Couldn't do the overnight shift, but arrived about 5:30am. Definitely surprised to see such a small line. Checked with the guy who appeared to be in charge, sitting in front of the line, who informed me that tickets had been sold to those waiting overnight and there were 50 wristbands left. When I asked if there were 50 people there already, he said "you'll get tickets" and handed me the very unofficial scrap of paper with number 45 on it, and I took my place on line. I informed those who arrived right after me to go get their number before getting on line and we reached number 50 very quickly. There was no way anyone arriving much later than 6:30am could have been in the group of 25 without numbers who eventually got tickets. Yes, someone was coming around as early as 6am telling those without numbers to go home, as they won't get tickets unless any of us first 50 bought less than 4 each. And yes, the line just kept growing anyway, no matter how many announcements he made. And yes, some of those people he told to leave stuck around and got their tickets. But I will say that the club did manage to kick some of the scalper/line substitues off line around 11am, which sent the scalpers scrambling - to the delight of us on line, and opening up a few extra slots for people w/out #s. And about what people perceived as a Debacle - this is NYC guys, anyone who didn't show up a week early should be amazed they even have ONE ticket. And much of the confusion on line came from a construction site right in the middle of the line that started their work at 8am and created a kind of Berlin wall separating the front from the middle of the line. In any case, my 4 tickets turned into two at 11am, but that's the breaks. And the 25 or so people who got those extra tickets after us first 50, probably caught a slower subway ride to Tramps than me - that's all. As far as the rest of the line goes this was quite simply a "you snooze you lose" situation. I hear the people at bobdylan.com are still scrambling for tix. "I can't help it if I'm lukcy". Reviews of the concert
