Thousands Of Radiohead Tickets On Resale Sites Ahead Of Onsale

The onsale for Radiohead’s UK and European tour dates in November and December kicked off Friday, Sept. 12. Despite the band’s efforts to get tickets into the hands of real fans at a fair price, tickets have already appeared on resale sites en masse.

As Music Ally reported, the band has been working with Openstage on the onsale, meaning fans had to register and unlock tickets first, before being able to purchase them. This allowed the Radiohead camp to vet everyone applying for tickets, making sure only real fans got the opportunity to purchase them.

However, tickets have already appeared on secondary sites, suggesting speculative selling – resellers advertising event tickets they do not yet own, but betting they’ll be able to source them once the general sale opens – is once again rampant for this tour.

The European alliance for face-value ticketing, FEAT, analyzed the market before the onsale kicked off last Friday. It found 1,751 Radiohead tickets listed for resale days before the general sale – the practice known as speculative ticketing.

The tickets were resold on Ticombo, a Germany-based resale website, with many tickets advertised at €1,500 ($1,760) or more, with some reaching prices of nearly €4,000 ($4,690).

Most of these tickets were listed by traders linked to WorldTix, a company based in Engelberg, Switzerland, that offers tickets for hundreds of concerts via Ticombo.

According to FEAT, “these listings almost certainly violated the EU’s Unfair Commercial Practices Directive.”

The alliance the proceeds to break down the resold ticket by markets:

262 resale tickets priced between €803 and €3,749 were listed for Radiohead’s four concerts scheduled at Madrid, Spain’s Movistar Arena, Nov. 4-8; 488 resale tickets priced between €540 and €3,348 listed for Berlin, Germany (four shows at Uber Arena, Dec. 8-12); 228 resale tickets priced between €771 and €2,049 listed for Bologna, Italy (four shows at Unipol Arena, Nov. 14-18); 288 resale tickets priced between €540 and €3,682 for the Denmark shows at Royal Arena Copenhagen, Dec. 1-5; and 485 resale tickets priced between €540 and €2,049 for the London shows at The O2, Nov. 21-25.

According to FEAT, this listing break several laws in effect in the host countries: “In Italy,” the alliance states, “resale must be through authorized resale websites only, and must take place at face value. Italian regulator AGCOM have issued serious fines to viagogo for similar breaches.”

FEAT continues to point out, that in Denmark, ticket resale must take place at face value. And in Germany and Spain, “these resales break the promoters’ terms and conditions, which explicitly prohibit resale higher than face value through unauthorized websites.”

Radiohead have announced that the band-approved resale of tickets would open Oct. 13 through approved websites only, with tickets sold through non-official channels subject to cancellation.

The Radiohead onsale is proof that the EU is failing to take the topic of for-profit ticket resale seriously. Its Digital Services Act, a law passed in October 2022 and in force for websites like Ticombo since February 2024, promised to create an easy system for reporting and removing illegal content online.

However, FEAT’s members have reported 139 illegal resale listings to ticket resale websites, representing nearly 1,000 tickets. None of these have been responded to, and when escalating complaints to national regulators, FEAT only received one reply – four months after the concert took place.

FEAT also found evidence that viagogo and Gigsberg, “are facilitating the resale of potentially illegal tickets for Radiohead’s upcoming concerts,” and “are also displaying advertisements on Google Search directing consumers to this illegal content.”

See: Radiohead To Return To The Road With 20-Show European Tour

Comments:

The promoters of the Spanish and German Radiohead concerts, MCT Agentur’s Scumeck Sabottka, and Doctor Music’s Neo Sala, are founding members of FEAT. They released the following joint statement: “Radiohead have taken strong measures to protect their fans, but once again we see no-good ticket scalping websites taking advantage of demand. Doctor Music and MCT, together with FEAT, will reinforce this effort by reporting as many of these illegal tickets as possible. We have been fighting speculative ticket resale for many years, and we remain determined to continue this battle until stronger and more enforceable laws are introduced to protect consumers against ticket resale fraud.”

FEAT director Sam Shemtob added, “despite the EU’s good intentions, ticket scalping remains rampant across Europe. Measures introduced in the Digital Services Act are not just failing ticket resale, but the burden of needing to diligently report illegal listings – which has so far proven pointless – wastes time that live event promoters can ill afford. The EU must finally take ticket resale seriously if it is to preserve its status as a global leader in consumer protection.”

Radiohead manager Julie Calland said, “Radiohead have always strived to protect their audience from exploitative ticket touts which, in the absence of robust government legislation, becomes increasingly challenging. The registration process is an attempt to deliver tickets as fairly as possible directly to fans at the prices the band intended. Fans will be encouraged to stay away from secondary sites and we’re working alongside venues, promoters and organisations like FanFair Alliance and FEAT, to shut down unauthorised sales at inflated prices – tickets that for the most part, don’t actually exist.”

A viagogo spokesperson told Pollstar, “viagogo advocates for fans to have choice, flexibility and access when buying tickets. We are fully compliant in the UK, where resale is highly regulated and permitted under the law.

“Some organizers take anti-competitive actions and try to limit where tickets can be bought or sold. We exist to serve fans on their terms – whether they missed the onsale, are buying tickets just days before the event, or need to sell at the last minute. And with viagogo, fans are always protected by our guarantee.

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