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What is the most expensive concert ticket ever sold?

Fri 21 February 2025 17:00, UK

Being a music fan isn’t always friendly to everyone’s wallet when going to concerts. As much as people like the idea of seeing their favourite acts play their greatest hits to whoever is within earshot, it gets a bit more complicated when they start adding up the zeros that are on the end of that price tag. While the price of an average ticket has skyrocketed compared to what the golden age of rock and roll was like, there are still once-in-a-lifetime tickets that are still unheard of in this day and age.

Granted, it’s the audience’s choice whether or not to fork over the money. One can only sell so many tickets to fill a venue, and even when someone has enough star power to make a stadium roar with excitement whenever they play, there are only so many times that people can milk as much as they can from the audience before they start looking even more greedy than they already are.

However, a lot of the price hikes might also have to do with the circumstances surrounding a certain gig. Although no one knew how big a show like Live Aid was going to be in the greater context of music history, seeing a tour that has done as well as Taylor Swift’s Eras run is still a phenomenon everyone is getting their heads around, especially looking at the four-figure prices that they start out at.

Then again, there’s a sense of excitement when people manage to snag tickets for something this important. After all, it might be the last time that any artist touches a stage if you pick the right gig, but if we’re talking about the biggest concert tickets of all time, we have to go back to the band that helped make excess commonplace in rock and roll.

So, who had the most expensive concert ticket ever?

Before hard rock had even become a known term, Led Zeppelin was already drawing massive crowds. Their version of bluesy rock and roll was quickly turning them into an institution, but the minute that John Bonham was gone, there was no real reason to continue. The whole point behind their greatest tunes came from all of them working together, and he was going to leave a gaping hole in their sound. Or was he?

It’s not anyone would be a feasible replacement for Bonzo, but whenever the band got together for various industry functions, they seemed to be having a good time jamming with each other. However, while something like Live Aid managed to be incredibly rough around the edges for them, their reunion concerts in 2007 were the moment where they could right the wrongs of their first reunion attempt.

While most bands of their ilk put together a reunion tour, Zeppelin’s reunion at the O2 arena for only one show was the only time fans could see them, with them forking over big money for one ticket. Although the prices started at $250, the charities were the ones that truly went above and beyond, giving away tickets for the show for a whopping $84,000.

And it’s not like the band didn’t give the fans their all, with Plant trying everything he could to recapture the magic of their old days and managing to give the fans a taste of what they could do when they released the live concert DVD Celebration Day. Then again, if Zeppelin was ever going to reunite for any reason, they were going to have to come correct if fans got a ticket that was worth more than some people’s homes are worth.