radiohead tickets secondary markets

Photo Credit: Kenny Sun / CC by 2.0

Just days after Radiohead unveiled their much-anticipated United Kingdom and European tour dates, a wave of speculative ticket listings have appeared on secondary sites. That’s before fans have even had the chance to login and buy direct.

The speculative listings come despite the band’s strict controls designed to thwart resellers—frustrating legitimate fans in the process. The Face-Value European Alliance for Ticketing (FEAT) has flagged over 1,750 potentially fraudulent listings for Radiohead’s arena shows on Ticombo, a resale platform based in Germany.

Many of these tickets were posted days before the official sale began on September 12, with prices ranging from €1,500 ($1,760) to nearly €4,000 ($4,690). Swiss traders listed more than £22,000 ($29,610) in tickets for a single London show, highlighting how speculative ticketers have streamlined the process of snatching tickets away from legitimate fans.

Radiohead attempted to protect their fans from this gouging by requiring fan registration and unlock codes for ticket purchases. At on-sale, tickets were prioritized for those leaving near concert venues and were released through official channels only. However, as Digital Music News highlights in its ‘Behind the Resale Curtain’ series—these measures are not enough to stop speculative ticketing profiteers.

“Radiohead have always strived to protect their audience from exploitative ticket touts which, in the absence of robust government legislation, becomes increasingly challenging,” the band’s manager, Julie Calland, told The Guardian.

“Fans will be encouraged to stay away from secondary sites and we will work alongside venues, promoters, and organizations like FanFair Alliance and FEAT to shut down unauthorized sales at inflated prices—tickets for the most part, don’t actually exist.”

While FEAT and other industry bodies condemned speculative listing, Ticombo initially defended its practices, stating that it merely “provides a technology platform” for secondary ticket sales. However, the platform eventually removed the dubious listings after media exposure. Viagogo, the UK’s largest secondary ticketing market has continued to list tickets despite the increased scrutiny.

Curious how these ticket flippers and speculative ticket sellers operate? Be sure to check out our ‘Behind the Resale Curtain‘ series to see how modern ticket scalpers are operating by flouting government regulations like the BOTS Act in the United States.