Filipino Tyler fans should expect to face some stiff competition as Manila tickets go on sale this March 5.
On February 26, Insignia Presents, a concert promoter and events production company, announced that it was bringing Grammy Award-winning rapper Tyler, The Creator to Manila as part of Chromakopia: The World Tour. Chromakopia is Tyler’s eighth studio album, released last October. The tour, featuring rapper Lil Yachty and rap duo Paris Texas, includes 96 shows across North America, Oceania, and Asia with Smart Araneta Coliseum in Cubao, Quezon City serving as the final stop on September 20. (Notably, Lil Yachty is not billed for the Manila show.)
Filipinos are some of Asia’s biggest fans of Tyler, who ranks among the country’s top 100 most-played artists on Spotify (as of this writing). With Tyler’s cult following for his fashion brand Golf Wang and Golf le Fleur, along with footwear collaborations with Converse, Suicoke, and Vans, the typical Tyler fan likely knows a thing or two about scoring the best deals — or even flipping items on demand for a profit. These practices are common in streetwear fashion, particularly with sneakers, but are becoming increasingly prevalent with concert tickets.
One Instagram user, who is an online reseller for thrifted items, wrote their frustration on Instagram Stories about possibly never getting a chance to buy a ticket to see Tyler. “I’m up against scalpers, every filipino fashion mf, hiphop fans, influencers, DJs, Icoylaa, those guys from Season Pass, Rafhaha, bini aiah, ateneo boys, the upper class, sarah [sic] duterte, southies, northies (im [sic] from mindanao).”
The Wild West of Resells
Ticketnet, Smart Araneta Coliseum’s official ticket provider, is designated to handle sales for this show, whether online or through ticket booths at Smart Araneta Coliseum. There are currently 11 ticket packages for Chromakopia, ranging from P3,000 to P25,000. According to Ticketnet’s terms and conditions, tickets “shall not be resold or offered for resale at a profit, including via online auction sites or any secondary market.” Likewise, the ticketing service cites Quezon City Ordinances that prohibit scalping, an offense punishable by criminal liabilities and penalties.
While this non-refundable, non-transferable, and non-exchangeable ticket policy is standard in the Philippines, it has proven to be neither practical nor strictly enforceable. Ticketnet doesn’t offer its own resale marketplace, so if you can’t attend for any reason, you’ll have to find your own way to transfer the ticket.
If you’re among the unlucky majority who needs to score a ticket once the show is sold out, your only means of recourse is likely X (formerly known as Twitter) or Facebook Marketplace, which is like the wild, wild west for concert tickets. Without any checks and balances to prove authenticity, you’ll just have to take their word for it. Similarly, there are “ticket assistance” services that are dedicated to helping potential buyers secure tickets to concerts. This is a slightly more dependable option, but it would depend on the provider you go for.
Given Tyler’s fanbase — many of whom are seasoned in the world of streetwear reselling — you shouldn’t be surprised if Chromakopia tickets are flipped for exorbitant amounts, capitalizing on scarcity in much the same way as fashion items. Tyler has addressed the banes of resell culture in a 2020 interview with Dazed. He called out brands that “put 10 things out so they can just say it ‘sold out,’ rather than they made 500 and it actually sold out.” He also said that reselling culture is “kind of getting gross now… It’s like, dude — why are they on that website… those are used boxers,” he said.
