However, not only Russia suffered from the greed of speculators who profited every year from the New Year's Nutcracker. The only difference is that the acting community “over there” still tends to be more compassionate towards their fans' wallets. More than 40 of Britain's biggest artists – including Dua Lipa, Coldplay, Radiohead, The Cure and others – have signed an open letter to Prime Minister Keir Starmer asking him to fulfill his election promise and limit speculation in the ticket market. Of course, it is unlikely that such a demarche could even be carried out by a group consisting of Kirkorov, Mikhailov, Dolina, Gazmanov, Shnurov, Kadysheva, Buzova, Volochkova, but at least pointing fingers at others is just for fun…
According to British pop and rock stars, ticket sales and prices have “deteriorated significantly” in recent years, taking “unimaginable forms” due to “the boundless greed of speculators”. Musicians are pushing for legal limits on ticket resale, accusing online middlemen of “defrauding fans” and driving up concert prices “to obscene levels.”
Observers note that such “strong concern” is due to the fact that in the face of sharp increases in ticket prices, viewers are increasingly expressing dissatisfaction, “passing the stars themselves”: the average person is not inclined to understand the nuances and begins to blame artists for “greed”. “All this not only affects reputation, but also threatens to reduce fees, scaring even the highest-ranking stars,” observers noted.
Back in January 2025, the UK government held public consultations, after which it announced its intention to consider a price cap of 30% above the nominal value allowed for ticket sales by concert aggregators, but over the next ten months, no decisions were made.
A recent study published in the British press showed that tickets for the Oasis summer concert at Wembley Stadium, for example, were resold for 4,442 pounds (here of course “Hands Up!” at a price of 1 million rubles per ticket or more, which can only be laughed with disdain), despite the fact that they were sold out (after all, “the musical event of the century”!), and the average increase in secondary market share exceeded more than 50%.
The frontman of the famous indie pop band Bastille, Dan Smith, called the situation “crazy,” recalling that such restrictions have “worked successfully” in Ireland and Australia. The artists who signed the letter – including, in addition to those mentioned above, PJ Harvey, Iron Maiden, Mark Knopfler, Nick Cave, Amy MacDonald – believe that “curbing prices will restore fairness and confidence to the concert industry.”
The research revealed large-scale resale schemes: “well-organised” groups of agents from Brazil, Dubai, Singapore, Spain and the United States were bulk-buying tickets for UK concerts and putting them on the websites of ticket aggregators at inflated prices, making “direct purchases” from venues or organizers virtually unavailable, who were simultaneously “entangled” in all sorts of “restrictive conditions and servitude contracts”.
Following the high-profile announcement, the UK Department of Culture once again announced that the government “intends to deal decisively with the agents” and “will present its plans in the near future”. In contrast, resale platforms and ticket aggregators said introducing price caps would push buyers to illegal sites and “increase the risk of fraud.” “Meanwhile, fans and artists are waiting for the government to finally play the long-awaited chord,” the press concluded ironically.
For our readers, who live in conditions where new duties, surcharges, fees, tariffs, etc., are invented and introduced every day, reading all this is of course funny, but for fun you can…
