[dfxm12]

If you like specific acts, sure. Or maybe some cities take independent venues more seriously than others. Growing up, ok I missed out on getting Metallica tickets because I didn't want to support clear channel (or Live Nation, or TM, etc...), but I still was able to see plenty of amazing metal bands in indie venues.

Another interesting note: Weird Al is playing three venues within driving distance from me. Only one of them is selling tickets through TM.

[midnitewarrior]

Go see Weird Al. It was a really great show. My wife only knew one of his songs (Word Crimes, she's a professional editor), and she loved the show. I loved it too.

[karl_gluck]

Strongly agreed. He played BlizzCon a few years back and it was my favorite part of the weekend.

[baggachipz]

I just saw him a couple weeks ago. It's such a fun show, people there are from ALL walks. He's no spring chicken but he gives it his all, and his band and backups do too. Just an all-around great dude.

[reactordev]

Will confirm, all-around great dude. He's the kind of guy you WOULD find in those independent venues. He'll happily go out of his way for it.

[magicalhippo]

> Growing up, ok I missed out on getting Metallica tickets because I didn't want to support clear channel (or Live Nation, or TM, etc...), but I still was able to see plenty of amazing metal bands in indie venues.

I saw Metallica once, many moons ago, and it was at this big venue which of course was Live Nation/TM. It sucked ass. Sound was terrible, had to watch screens to see what was going on, beer was ridiculously priced and yet somehow long queues.

I decided then I wouldn't go to those venues anymore. If a band I like plays there, whatever, not worth it.

Meanwhile I've had many, many concert experiences that were 100x better than the Metallica concert for a fraction of the price of the Metallica ticket at small, local venues.

My buddy recently invited me to another such big-ass venue with some popular band, and it just cemented by view. So not worth it.

[wolvoleo]

True, I do see a thriving ecosystem here in Europe for some more fringey types of acts. There's like resident advisor ( https://ra.co ), XCEED ( https://xceed.me ) . Probably because some events don't meet ticketmaster's T&Cs (they can be a bit spicy).

In fact I have not used ticketmaster in the last 2 years, the last time was a big ticket stadium-type thing. Most of the events I attend are doing it through resident advisor and I have about 40 tickets in my history there now. I'm glad the ecosystem hold by ticketmaster is being broken, at least here in Europe.

Though even there you do see some ticketmaster crap popping up like universe.com