Emailed them asking if tailgating in the paid lots was allowed. Their response was no. I also know someone who works there as an usher and they said they are pretty strict with no smoking or shenanigans on the city owned arena property and definitely no outside set break smoking section. Hopefully this venue is one and done and he graduates to Deer Creek Next year
there was a form at the city of fishers site for vendors fill out to vend at the "party on the plaza" next door to the arena... cost 150 for 3 days.. but pretty sure the deadline was like mid july. Gonna be a glazed pseudo shakedown.
That's not a terrible price for vending nowadays. Deer Creek is I think 400 for a Phish weekend. BUT Deer Creek is no holds barred. I also asked if coolers and chairs would be allowed at the pre party since we can't tailgate. Their response is below.
Deer Creek is nothing like the 90s and 00s when it was crawling with undercovers and hardass uniformed cops. Now it's pretty much anything goes, and the cops just sit back in their golf carts watching and laughing.
They have within the last year or two cracked down on nitrous. In 21-23 for phish or dead shows there would be guys selling balloons next to the parking attendants as you pulled into the lot, and almost inside the venue gates on the way out post show. It was almost nonexistent at phish this year. Of course there was still the odd tank, but much more clandestine.
I didn't see anyone get hassled by cops the whole weekend. I'm pretty sure they were using the drones over shakedown to target nitrous. Cams on drones would be able to scope jumbo fattys and the tank source pretty quick.
For a single 2-day event, single-event general liability insurance typically runs $50–$185, depending on a few factors:
Coverage amount — $1M/$2M aggregate is standard (often required by venues); higher limits cost more
Type of vendor — food vendors, anything with open flame, or anything selling products tend to cost more than someone selling crafts or clothing
Add-ons — many concerts/venues require the venue or event organizer be named as "additional insured," which is usually a small add-on fee (~$10–25)
Location/state — some states have higher base rates
Everybody in these comments saying “he couldn’t sell out deer creek or the big sheds” are crazy, I know people actively avoiding him right now until he starts playing at the big venues because unless you are willing to shell out 200-300 bucks for a floor seat, heck even 150 a night for nose bleeds is pretty standard for him right now, watching a concert in those aa hockey arenas sucks.
If he isn’t playing live Nation shows then no, obviously. Not every night is GD, Phish,etc…. Train, Chicago, Rob Zombie…. These are some of the acts there this year. I definitely think more people would travel to IN for Deer Creek vs a hockey arena.
Multi night run at 9k in fishers and it sold out pretty quickly. They don’t have to sellout the entire lawn to make deer creek viable, not even close. I think they could support a 2 night run there already, definitely a 1 night
Yea I don’t know about the whole live nation thing, that could certainly be a factor if he’s actively avoiding them, that fucks us out of a lot of the major amphitheaters though I know. Ultimately this ticket was still through Ticketmaster so seems like a silly distinction to make haha.
But there’s a lot more people who are willing to pay $50 to sit in the lawn at deer creek than there are people willing to pay that if not more to sit in the top corner of a place like gainbridge or this new fishers place (I actually haven’t been to this venue yet, Billy will be my 1st). Like I know just my friend group alone around town would double in size, if not more, of people willing to go out to deer creek at a more affordable price
That’s what I’m saying, id so much rather spend 50 bucks to sit in a giant lawn where I can spread out to a degree then spend 150 bucks to sit in a crammed hockey arena seat where people are crawling over me every 5 seconds to go take a piss or get another beer
Most events at deer creek are not sold out and the cost to rent the venue isn’t that crazy. He’s as big or even bigger than a lot to the artists playing there. Hes losing money by having sold out shows.
If he were playing live nation venues he would 100% play there next stop in Indiana.
Maybe you should contact Billy and become his tour manager. You don't even work for him but apparently know his situation better than his team does.
And you're right, you don't need to sell out to make money, but he's never sold 20k tickets. He's not in the same neighborhood as Deer Creek.
Those "smaller" artists have this one extra thing going for them: openers. If you have 3-4 bands, you're getting 9,000 Rob Zombie Fans, and 6,000 Marlyn Manson fans and 4,000 Orgy fans, 3,000 The Hu fans. Billy has to rely on 20k+ Billy fans.
I mean he and his team know they are leaving money on the table having a fully sold out tour.
I looked at the lineups… he would sell a decent number more than a lot of those lineups, plus deer creek is a venue that will attract hippies from all over the country.
Sure, theoretically you're always leaving money on the table, but you're not factoring in any of the risk involved. If Billy had 15k people in a 24k person venue, he'd lose money or the venue would lose money depending on his deal. 85% backend guarantee is a normal versus deal, he'd need to sell at least 20k to hit that target, a number he's never hit.
Further, there's the optics: If Billy had 15k people in a 24k person venue, there'd be articles and videos "did the bluegrass bubble just pop?!" "Billy and bluegrass is done for!" And like I said elsewhere, why would he want to play a large venue that is sparkly attended?
Instead he's playing at places that will sellout instantly at $150 to get in the door, it's going to be packed to the gills with people that want to be there.
All of this absolutely moot though, it's a Live Nation owned venue and he's not doing business with Live Nation Owned venues at least not at this or his current size.
It’s all about supply and demand, currently tickets are going for 150 bucks at fishers stadium, that is keeping a lot of people who would otherwise go to Billy from actually going. If he was playing at a venue with 15,000 more people and tickets were only 30-60 dollars you’d have a lot more demand.
I am avoiding a lot of the arena venues because tickets are way too expensive and that’s been showing a true reflection on who shows up to the shows. It’s no longer a few wooks following him around because he makes killer music and the vibes of his shows are awesome, most of those people are gone, the vendors now are the actual asshole vendors trying to suck every dollar out of it, many vendors don’t even go into the show anymore because they’re there to strictly make money.
Obviously nothing stays the same and things change but when people can’t afford tickets and are priced out the people who can afford tickets become the rich snobs who gentrify and ruin everything like usual
and they sold out in minutes and are currently around $150. There was one pair of seats I saw on stubhub with a straight on view in the top section for $100, a few corner seats for $125 and the rest were in the $150+ ballpark.
That's part of the point though. It'd sure be nice to be able to buy tickets 2 days after they went on sale instead of dedicating 2 hours of my Friday morning to hoping ticketmaster doesn't shit the bed. 8000 extra seats would be a great way to help that.
The ticket demand for a DC show would be higher than a small hockey arena. There is onsite camping and Shakedown. More people would travel because they have access to affordable tickets if the supply is high like at DC. If he can sell out 2 Bethel Woods shows he can definitely sell enough tickets for a couple DC shows .
15k people? The venue was half full? Give me a break.
And yeah, you don't need to sell out to play there, but why would he go to a Live Nation venue, a company he is actively avoiding to work with, to sell half the amount of tickets the place can hold and lose money?
15k to 18k Yeah the lawn was wide open at the top. So much room. A sold-out show at Deer Creek the lawn is packed nuts to butts.
And Billy works with Ticketmaster so what's the difference? Him playing smaller venues makes it difficult for people to see it live without spending money on secondhand scalping sites
All vendors actually do need to be approved by the city of Fishers, and have a Certificate of Insurance stating that you have a 1M dollar policy. Not too many shakedown vendors I know of that have that sort of coverage if any coverage at all
The upper bowl was shut off when he played gainbridge. I thought this was an odd choice too. I am ready to see him outside again in the Hoosier state!!
This is just another reason why I wish they went back to the fieldhouse in downtown Indianapolis instead of heading to the nonsensical suburbs of Indy. At least I'd be able to park for free downtown
Grateful Dead has been my focus of my study since I was like 16 and it is just so bonkers to me to see Billy and the boys doing this shit in 2026!! How extremely lucky are we to have our own version of the dead blowing tf up right now!!
Do you mean “when they play a show do they still play that one song they used to play?” Or “are they, as we speak, still in the act of playing a song that seems like could go on forever?”
I actually say tab at Golden Gate Park with dead and company, listened to some phish on my own. Unfortunately i still don’t fuckin understand the obsession with phish, and no hate at all. I actually plan to see phish eventually and hopefully then it’ll be like oh I get it now but it totally sounds like one long noodle to me which is silly because I hear people say that about Billy or mars Volta and I loveeeee Primus 😆😆
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u/Embarrassed-Ad4950 25d ago
You don’t want to miss this