Aerosmith Tampa Cancelled
by John Wilson
I probably should have known. A 7.5 hour road trip to see a band of 60 year olds is a bad idea. Not to mention it was on the same night as UFC 100, arguably the best UFC card in the history of the sport.
There was no way I could say no – it was on my wife’s bucket list, and she rarely asks for anything.
As I was closing up shop at work, a co-worker who knew I was going to the show pointed out that Aerosmith had canceled several of the last shows because of an “undisclosed injury to a band member.” I surfed the web before we left and found several sites that said, “Aerosmith confirms they will definitely have the Tampa show.”
I left work early, set my new GPS for Tampa, FL and started the 7.5 hour road trip. Of all the trips on the whereisjohnwilson.com Summer Tour, this was one I was looking forward to.
Upon arriving at the Holiday Inn Express in Tampa, the desk attendant guy says, “Hey, you guys going to the Aerosmith Concert? They canceled about two hours ago (insert evil laugh).” Mind you, they said, “we are definitely playing tomorrow night.” After doing a little research from the hotel room, Joe Perry called into some random local radio show and announced the cancellation. Nice. Don’t you think they probably knew early that morning. Wouldn’t you think they’d imagine people would be traveling to see them?
We did get to visit the Seminole Hard Rock Hotel and Casino where neither of us gambled a dime (the place was packed and the lowest blackjack table was $25 a hand). We didn’t really find much to do in Tampa, though we didn’t look very hard. We drove back the 7.5 hour trip to Charleston just in time for UFC 100.
Update: Three weeks later and Live Nation still hasn’t refunded our tickets. They state they can’t give us our money back until the band reschedules the show. This makes no sense to me. No service, no pay. The way I see it, Live Nation is sitting on an interest free loan from the Bank of Wilson.
Update: see here for instructions on how to get a refund
Lessons learned:
- Never trust a rock star over 55
- Never travel more than four hours for a concert
- Tampa does a bad job of being appealing on the Internet
- Live Nation will hold your money hostage
Sheesh, get a grip. Things happen. I’m bummed I didn’t get to go the concert either but I didn’t let it ruin the evening. Too bad you weren’t able to make the best of it. But at least you made it back in time to watch a fight on tv. If only there was a tv in the Tampa area, maybe you could have taken your wife out someplace new and then watched it here.
p.s. since when did July 11 to July 30 equal three weeks? However I do agree the refund “procedure” for Live Nation sucks.
Thanks for the comment Chuck.
We actually did check out Tampa some, but they didn’t seem to have any televisions. Weird, huh?
The part that doesn’t make sense to me is why Live Nation needs a reschedule date to refund the tickets?
Well, maybe you’ll decide to make the trip again for the rescheduled concert. I’ll give you a few places you and your wife can check out and hopefully you’ll have a better experience.
Until then, I’ll still be complaining about Live Nation with you.
I’ll take you up on it.
If I would have invested that money into Ford (F) at the time I purchased the tickets I would have made 400%. I hope LiveNation is enjoying my loan.
[...] my unsuccessful trip to see the cancelled Aerosmith concert in Tampa I noticed the little orange sticker seen to the right on all of the gas pumps. These stickers [...]