Business

TICKET BLITZKREIG

It’s the boss vs. The Boss.

Media mogul and Ticketmaster honcho Barry Diller yesterday took aim at Bruce Springsteen, blasting the rocker for playing a role in a concert-ticket flap earlier this year that put Ticketmaster and its ticketing policies squarely in the spotlight at a time when the company is trying to get Washington’s OK for a controversial merger with rival Live Nation.

After catching flack for a technical glitch that redirected Springsteen fans from Ticketmaster to the company’s higher-priced reseller TicketsNow.com, Diller got some vindication after it was revealed that Springsteen held back a huge block of tickets for himself and his entourage for shows last month at the Izod Center in East Rutherford, NJ.

“Bruce Springsteen has been one of our most vocal critics on our ticketing policies and while he’s more than entitled to his opinion, it seems minimally fair-minded to point out that in the concert that created the fracas, where Ticketmaster apologized for making a technical mistake, it seems that Mr. Springsteen held back from his fans all but 108 of the 1,126 tickets closest to the stage,” Diller said.

Diller was referring to a revelation made earlier this week in the Newark Star-Ledger that of 1,126 of the best seats available at a May 21 performance of Bruce Sprinsteen and the E Street Band, just 108 were available for sale to the public.

In all, according to analysis by the Star-Ledger, nearly 2,300 seats at the Izod Center were held back for the May 21 show, with most going to friends of the band, the record label and the New Jersey Sports and Exhibition Authority, which operates the arena.

Springsteen’s manager, Jon Landau, maintained that “the vast majority” of tickets closest to the stage are in fact sold to Springsteen fans.

And while Landau admitted Springsteen and his posse hold back tickets for Jersey shows, “These are used by Bruce and his band members; by the record label for their staff, for reviewers, and for radio stations; by charities who are provided with tickets that they may auction; and for other similar purposes.”

Nevertheless, the holdback raises questions about whether Springsteen contributed to the Ticketmaster kerfuffle by cutting into the supply of available tickets.

Ticketmaster suffered a p.r. nightmare in February after Springsteen fans howled that they were being forced by the retailer to pay hundreds of dollars more for tickets with face values of between $65 and $95. The company blamed the mess on a computer glitch, apologized to fans and in many cases offered refunds.

However, the fracas became a flash point for everyone from congressional members to Springsteen himself, who blasted Ticketmaster for orchestrating a bait-and-switch scheme.

For Ticketmaster, the timing couldn’t have been worse: The company weeks before had announced a plan to merge with concert company Live Nation to create a company that would control venues, concert tickets and, in some cases the artists who are performing.