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Ticketmaster is partnering with metal band Avenged Sevenfold to offer fans NFT-gated pre-sale tickets to the band’s tour.
The trial will reportedly enable NFT holders from the band’s fan club — Death Bats Club — to integrate their crypto wallet with Ticketmaster in order to get priority access to tickets and reserved seating with no queues.
Singer Matt Sanders, an early advocate for NFTs and Web3, said on Twitter the NFT-gating would ensure “fans get the best tickets at the best prices without bots, scalpers and long wait times”.
Fans have already used the feature to purchase tickets for events at New York’s Madison Square Garden and The Forum in Los Angeles ahead of the general public. Now the initiative will go live for the rest of the dates available on Ticketmaster.
The band launched the Death Bats Club in 2021 — a collection of 10,000 NFTs with unique visual traits that unlock real-life perks such as care packages, meet-and-greet opportunities, and now early-access ticketing.
NFT-gating would ensure “fans get the best tickets at the best prices without bots, scalpers and long wait times”
“Ticketmaster has already issued more than 5 million NFTs as commemorative tokens for major events including the Super Bowl, but this is the first token-gated integration for purchasing tickets directly. Currently it is a pilot program but may roll out to more artists based on demand,” David Marcus, Ticketmaster’s executive VP of global music, told Billboard.
“Avenged Sevenfold used the capability to offer first access to tickets, but there are a variety of ways it can be used by artists in the future. From unlocking premier seats to special experiences like sitting in on soundcheck.
“Token-gated ticket sales are available as part of our expanding Web3 services and other features that help artists set their own terms on how tickets get to fans. Any artist who is minting their own NFTs or partnering with another independent community can explore with token-gated ticketing now.”
Ticketmaster’s token-gated sales are currently compatible with tokens minted on Ethereum and stored in dapp wallets, such as MetaMask or Coinbase.
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A 19-year-old stagehand lost his life last night in a tragic accident at an Avenged Sevenfold show in Stuttgart.
The man was killed during load-out at the Hanns-Martin-Schleyer-Halle (15,500-cap.) when another crewman, a 26-year-old, fell on him from 20m (66ft) while taking down the band’s lighting truss. The other man is in critical condition in hospital.
According to Bild, it the first fatal incident at the venue since its opening in 1983. The paper also identifies the victim as ‘Marvin P’.
In a joint statement, Avenged Sevenfold sent their “thoughts and prayers to the man in the hospital, both families involved, all of the local Live Nation crew and everyone else whose lives have been affected by this terrible accident”.
“This is such a stark reminder of how quickly an accident can happen and lives shattered in the process”
“We love our crew so much, as well as the many local staff who are essential to our show every night, wherever we are around the world,” it reads. “This is such a stark reminder of how quickly an accident can happen and lives shattered in the process.”
Support act Disturbed dedicated “the rest of this tour to our fallen brothers”. “The horror and heartbreak felt by everyone on the tour is beyond words,” they wrote on Facebook.
Tonight’s show, at the Mediolanum Forum in Milan, has been cancelled due to illness.
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Though its previously announced partnership with iHeartMedia has apparently yet to bear fruit, Universal Music Group (UMG) is upping its experiments with virtual reality (VR) with the launch of a dedicated app, VRTGO, in partnership with its subsidiary Capitol Records and VR production company VRLive.
The new platform will launch officially tomorrow (27 October) with a live-streamed VR performance by Capitol artists Avenged Sevenfold. The show will be shot by Nokia OZO VR cameras, which also record 3D/spatial audio.
“VRTGO is a truly immersive and creative platform for our artists to tell their stories and invite their fans around the world to experience live performances and music videos like never before,” says Deborah Hyacinth, UMG’s senior vice-president of digital marketing innovation. “We’ve employed state-of-the-art technology to make VRTGO a cross-device platform and home to some of the world’s best VR content.”
“Virtual reality is destined to change the media landscape, which will enable users to not just view entertainment – rather, it allows them to experience it”
VRLive’s CEO’s, Heiner Lippman, adds: “We are excited about our partnership with Universal Music Group, as it gives us the opportunity to provide the viewing audience with unprecedented levels of access. Virtual reality is destined to change the media landscape, which will enable users to not just view entertainment – rather, it allows them to experience it, and VRLive will continue to transform how people view and interact with the world around them.”
Live Nation signed a similar agreement with NextVR in May that will be see select shows shot and distributed in virtual reality. A Nielsen study earlier this month revealed that early adopters of VR are big consumers of live music, outspending the average concertgoer by 195%.
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The storm-hit 2016 festival season claimed another victim last weekend in the form of metal festival Houston Open Air in Texas.
On Saturday afternoon the festival site, in the 350-acre NRG Park in Houston, was evacuated due to concerts over lightning, with festivalgoers told to take shelter at the nearby NRG Center (80,000-cap.) stadium or in their cars. The festival resumed later, albeit without a number of acts, including Anthrax and Sevendust.
Sunday was called off altogether, with a statement from the festival reading: “The forecast calls for lightning in the immediate area on and off all day, making it unsafe to human life to reopen the festival”.
“If we were fly-by-night promoters and wanted to roll the dice and take our chances, I could have been calling you guys this morning having a completely different conversation”
Due to headline on Sunday were Avenged Sevenfold and Deftones, the former of whom played an indoor show at the White Oak (1,500-cap.) instead:
Houston! We are taking over the White Oak Music Hall TONIGHT for those of you with a Houston Open Air ticket. 10pm. First come. 18 & up pic.twitter.com/PpPbmeEBQ3
— Avenged Sevenfold (@TheOfficialA7X) September 26, 2016
Festival booker Gary Spivack, of Danny Wimmer Presents, told local radio station 94.5 The Buzz: “We can all handle the rain but when there is lightning and wind it becomes more difficult. […] God forbid there is a lot of electricity rolling around at a festival.
“If we were fly-by-night promoters and wanted to roll the dice and take our chances, I could have been calling you guys this morning having a completely different conversation.”
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