Kid Rock gave an impassioned testimony before the Senate Commerce Committee earlier today, addressing the ongoing issues plaguing the ticketing industry and the unfair practices employed at the expense of both artists and fans.
In his five-minute speech at the hearing, titled “Fees Rolled on All Summer Long: Examining the Live Entertainment Industry,” the musician outlined how the ticketing industry has evolved on the promise of lowering costs and benefitting all areas of live entertainment, but has in turn become an industry plagued with “fraud and abuse.”
Rock, whose real name is Robert Ritchie, explained earlier today that he was in a “unique position” to testify before Congress because “unlike most of my peers, I am beholden to no one — no record companies, no managers, no corporate endorsements or deals. To put it plainly, I ain’t scared to speak out on these issues like many artists, managers and agents are for fear of biting the hand that feeds them.”
He referred to Pearl Jam’s testimony in 1994 against Ticketmaster having a monopoly over the ticketing business, and turned his attention to Live Nation and Ticketmaster’s merger that led to the formation of Live Nation Entertainment in 2010.
“In 2009, Congress was told under oath that merging Live Nation and Ticketmaster would benefit artists and fans,” said Rock. “The CEO of Live Nation called the merger an experiment, and promised it would increase competition and lower costs.” He continued, “Needless to say, that experiment has failed miserably. Independent venues have been crushed. Artists have lost leverage. Fans are paying more than ever, and getting blamed for it. Should Ticketmaster and Live Nation be broken up? Probably. Would that alone fix things? Not sure it would. But I am sure of this: no artist should be forced to sell their tickets without a say in who sells them and how they are sold.”
“It’s no secret,” he said, “that this industry is full of greedy snakes and scoundrels. Too many suits lining their pockets over talent they never had and fans they mislead. The truth is, much of this could have been or still could be solved through technology, especially proof of humanity tools. It hasn’t happened yet because there’s just too much money in the secondary ticket market. Ticketing companies didn’t fail to stop this; seems they chose not to.”
Rock implored Congress to subpoena the contracts throughout the industry and said that they would find “mountains of fraud and abuse.” He concluded by offering various solutions to the issues, including artists controlling who sells their tickets and how; resale ticket price caps; and outlawing speculative ticketing. “This wasn’t an experiment,” he said. “It was a monopoly dressed up as innovation. So I’ll close now with the words of one of my favorite rock bands, the Who, and say it is my sincere hope we won’t get fooled again.”
Rock has made fixing the ticketing industry a priority in his career, meeting with Donald Trump in March 2025 as the President signed an executive order intended to protect fans by cracking down on exploitative ticket scalping.
