NEWS
Bastille’s Dan Smith admits that he is ‘still an anxious wreck’ on stage, as he blasts ticket touts for ‘conning’ fans
3 d
This morning, Dan Smith from Bastille joined The Chris Moyles Show on Radio X.
Bastille frontman Dan Smith admitted on The Chris Moyles Show this morning that, despite being with the band for 15 years, he is still ‘an anxious wreck’ on stage, with the group announcing a brand-new tour. Dan also blasted ticket touts for creating their own sub-industry by reselling tickets at inflated prices, saying that music fans are being conned into paying over the odds to see their favourite artists.
Dan Smith – Ds
Chris Moyles – CM
Dominic Byrne – DB
CM: “I'm going to guess that pretty much every major city centre in Europe pretty much looks the same. You've got your show in the night so, you're going to be sleeping or travelling, and then you're basically killing time, I guess, waiting for the show?”
DS: “Like any other job where you'd go away, it comes with all the same things, right? So, whilst it's a massive privilege to get to see that people love your music and play in front of people and that bit, you know, obviously the bits in between…. For me, I'm like a massive insomniac. So, the bus overnight – the reason we're on buses is because you're driving and you're trying to get as much travel in as efficiently as possible. So, you and the crew and the band and everyone drive overnight. I can't sleep on the bus. So that's a little bit irritating. And yeah, it's a busy day. It'll be like, promotion; if you're me, writing and recording in any time that you can find, sound checks, and the gigs. But then, in and amongst that also, because you're kind of transient and travelling all time, you're going to these places, but there's no time. I'm like, ‘Right speed tourism. Now, where can we go? What can we see?’ Which I think got boring for the other guys very quickly.”
DB: “Yeah.”
DS: “So yeah, I guess it's just about trying to get as much out but as possible. And you know, some people absolutely love being on stage. They live for those moments. They like feeding off a crowd. I'm an anxious wreck.”
CM: “Really? Still?”
DS: “Yeah. But you know, I still get to make music with my friends. I'm very lucky.”
[…]
DS: “In Ireland, it's illegal to resell a ticket for anything more than face value, and it's just completely changed ticket buying there.”
CM: “I was about to say, what realistically can people do though about that? But that seems so obvious now you've said that out loud.”
DS: “There are sites out there that resell tickets at a genuine price, which is fantastic. There are those that slightly inflate it, and then there are touts that basically buy all the tickets. They then buy real estate on Google searches, or the search engines, so they come up above genuine ticket places. It's all out there to just kind of con the ticket buyers. And, like, I’m chatting about this, because I think it's like, I've had that experience, friends have had that experience. I've seen our fans trying to buy tickets to our shows. And we keep on like prices as low as possible, because we want our gigs to be accessible.”
CM: “It’s frustrating for you, I imagine, as an artist. Because so for you to do a show, let’s say in Manchester, right? So you do Manchester Arena, that costs money for you to do that show. Now, you don't want to get into the ins and outs of it, because you just want the fans to come along and have a great night and enjoy the show. But the logistics of that show, even just that one show on its own, the logistics, the money, the organisation, the trucks, the people to build the stage, everything, it costs a lot of money. So, you want to keep that?”
DS: “Yeah, we do because. The reason it costs money is that's people's jobs. It's so easy to see a tour a like the artist on stage or the band on stage, but behind every single artist and band there's loads of jobs, be that people working at the venue, crew drivers, truck drivers. There’s a whole little mini economy. And obviously, there's loads of people touring the UK. And the music industry is struggling at a grassroots level. So, there’s this really interesting statistic, that touts took, last year, £145m out of what could have been going back into the music industry. And that's not just going into artist pockets. That's like grassroots venues, that's letting tours happen that bring up other bands, that's venues, that's all of it. But that's a crazy amount of money. And that's literally like just scammers who have, like, come along and created a sub industry that's just creaming off the top, which is real shame. And I guess the Ireland thing is such a helpful… For me, it was just really helpful to understand, like, it’s very close to home. They'd be like, ‘No, that's illegal. You can't do that.’ And the whole industry just gone away.”
CM: “It just seems obvious, right? You buy a ticket for £35; you can’t go, you sell it for £35. A lot of these sites were genuinely, like, if you buy tickets to a gig, a lot of them would are genuinely set up with the right intentions. But then a lot them get abused by the tout situation.”
Bastille frontman Dan Smith admitted on The Chris Moyles Show this morning that, despite being with the band for 15 years, he is still ‘an anxious wreck’ on stage, with the group announcing a brand-new tour. Dan also blasted ticket touts for creating their own sub-industry by reselling tickets at inflated prices, saying that music fans are being conned into paying over the odds to see their favourite artists.
Chris Moyles – CM
Dominic Byrne – DB
CM: “I'm going to guess that pretty much every major city centre in Europe pretty much looks the same. You've got your show in the night so, you're going to be sleeping or travelling, and then you're basically killing time, I guess, waiting for the show?”
DS: “Like any other job where you'd go away, it comes with all the same things, right? So, whilst it's a massive privilege to get to see that people love your music and play in front of people and that bit, you know, obviously the bits in between…. For me, I'm like a massive insomniac. So, the bus overnight – the reason we're on buses is because you're driving and you're trying to get as much travel in as efficiently as possible. So, you and the crew and the band and everyone drive overnight. I can't sleep on the bus. So that's a little bit irritating. And yeah, it's a busy day. It'll be like, promotion; if you're me, writing and recording in any time that you can find, sound checks, and the gigs. But then, in and amongst that also, because you're kind of transient and travelling all time, you're going to these places, but there's no time. I'm like, ‘Right speed tourism. Now, where can we go? What can we see?’ Which I think got boring for the other guys very quickly.”
DB: “Yeah.”
DS: “So yeah, I guess it's just about trying to get as much out but as possible. And you know, some people absolutely love being on stage. They live for those moments. They like feeding off a crowd. I'm an anxious wreck.”
CM: “Really? Still?”
DS: “Yeah. But you know, I still get to make music with my friends. I'm very lucky.”
[…]
DS: “In Ireland, it's illegal to resell a ticket for anything more than face value, and it's just completely changed ticket buying there.”
CM: “I was about to say, what realistically can people do though about that? But that seems so obvious now you've said that out loud.”
DS: “There are sites out there that resell tickets at a genuine price, which is fantastic. There are those that slightly inflate it, and then there are touts that basically buy all the tickets. They then buy real estate on Google searches, or the search engines, so they come up above genuine ticket places. It's all out there to just kind of con the ticket buyers. And, like, I’m chatting about this, because I think it's like, I've had that experience, friends have had that experience. I've seen our fans trying to buy tickets to our shows. And we keep on like prices as low as possible, because we want our gigs to be accessible.”
CM: “It’s frustrating for you, I imagine, as an artist. Because so for you to do a show, let’s say in Manchester, right? So you do Manchester Arena, that costs money for you to do that show. Now, you don't want to get into the ins and outs of it, because you just want the fans to come along and have a great night and enjoy the show. But the logistics of that show, even just that one show on its own, the logistics, the money, the organisation, the trucks, the people to build the stage, everything, it costs a lot of money. So, you want to keep that?”
DS: “Yeah, we do because. The reason it costs money is that's people's jobs. It's so easy to see a tour a like the artist on stage or the band on stage, but behind every single artist and band there's loads of jobs, be that people working at the venue, crew drivers, truck drivers. There’s a whole little mini economy. And obviously, there's loads of people touring the UK. And the music industry is struggling at a grassroots level. So, there’s this really interesting statistic, that touts took, last year, £145m out of what could have been going back into the music industry. And that's not just going into artist pockets. That's like grassroots venues, that's letting tours happen that bring up other bands, that's venues, that's all of it. But that's a crazy amount of money. And that's literally like just scammers who have, like, come along and created a sub industry that's just creaming off the top, which is real shame. And I guess the Ireland thing is such a helpful… For me, it was just really helpful to understand, like, it’s very close to home. They'd be like, ‘No, that's illegal. You can't do that.’ And the whole industry just gone away.”
CM: “It just seems obvious, right? You buy a ticket for £35; you can’t go, you sell it for £35. A lot of these sites were genuinely, like, if you buy tickets to a gig, a lot of them would are genuinely set up with the right intentions. But then a lot them get abused by the tout situation.”
