They played Michael's 8th Avenue with Lucious Jackson right around the time "check your head" came out. Intimate, incredible...
Anyone know where I can get Brass Monkey downtown?

What's with the outfits? are they doing The Blues Brothers or what?

It's called putting on a show stebbin

DAMNIT SAM!! I was hoping this would go unnoticed so I would have an easier time trying to get tickets. The B-Boys have been the group I've wanted to see for the longest time and for various reasons have not yet. I plan to remedy that today.

Stebbin,

They've been sporting suits for a few years now. Not sure exactly why. Maybe they feel like they've outgrown the Adidas shoes, knit caps and puffy winter coats of yesteryear.

Sam, you're right about them outgrowing the look of yesteryear. The NY Times Magazine did a fashion spread about 2 years ago with The Boys modeling $2,000+ suits. They felt that at the age of 40 they should be dressing in a more sophisticated manner.

Saw them years ago with Public Enemy at the Arena, then two years ago at VFest. They were rockin' the suits in the 100 degree weather. They owned the Vfest that day, best show of the day. The robot ruled!!
This and a gig in North Carolina are warmups before playing Bonaroo next weekend. I'll be there on Tuesday night, who's with me??

Ive been trying to see them for 15 years. I'll be pretty devastated if I don't get tickets this afternoon.

sold out in 5 minutes Sessa, Thanks for telling everybody. ;(

C'mon....the Ram's Head Website is that slow?? They sold out in what 8min?

sold out in 5 minutes Sessa, Thanks for telling everybody. ;(

Does anyone else think Ram's Head is the worst venue around? The internet was the only way to get Beastie's tix and after I get past the first hurdle - the links do not work to actually buy tickets. By the time the page reloads, the show is sold out.

I'll have to put Ram's Head just under the Nissan Pavilion as places I will never go to a show.

That was frustrating at best. A web only sale for Ram's Head? Please.

That was beyond frustrating...an ERROR message? Followed by a broken link followed by SOLD OUT! Ugh!

Ram's Head is a great venue to see an act, but in this case CLEARLY they did not have the infrastructure in place to handle the demand. Calls into question if they could handle a sitution like this in the future, or are there shader things going on?? if I get on Stubhub tonight at tix are going for $200+ I'm going to be...

I was refreshing the ticket page until the Buy Tickets link came up, then was directed to an Error page each time. I waited to buy tickets all day long. Thanks Rams Head.

How is it that I was prompted to buy tickets, entered in 2 and then suddenly error, error and crash then tickets are gone. I am so disappointed in the way this sale was run. I knew their site would not be equipped to handle the influx of people wanting to purchase tickets. It's [crap]

I almost cried when I got those error messages, but I hit back arrow and persisted. Haven't seen then since '87 in Cleveland. I'M SO PSYCHED

Yup, same deal with me and about 5 other peeps. You know they were gonna get slammed, but for chrissake THAT was re-gat-dam-diculous

nobody is worth $200+ then to put up with the concert complains mention in this blog. nobody!

Hurry, just went to the site and tickets are available!!!

So disappointing. I had 2 other people trying for me too.

I applaud the effort to weed out scalpers, but it was also disappointing to get to the ticket page multiple times, thinking I'd gotten tickets, and then get an error or a time out or just kicked off the page. I would've stood in line in the rain, too. Oh well.

I was annoyed like everyone else until I saw Penelope's post. I lucked out and got two at 5:04PM. Maybe it helps if you create an account on the Ram's Head site first? That said, the 4:00PM internet cattle call was a disaster, to say the least.

Stevie Wonder sold 4,000 tickets at Pier Six Pavilion in 2 minutes. Phish sold 18,000 tickets at Merriweather in 2 minutes.

Unfortunately, when the demand is that high so much boils down to luck.

Good for you Doug, I was hoping people were still reading these posts!
Have a GREAT time at the show!!!

hi. i would just like to say, that i was able to snag 2 tickets through the website. It never timed out for me. It was slow but I got through.

Sturmy, you won't have to worry about the tix being on StubHub, as they will only permit people to enter the club who purchased the tix on their credit card (and show their ID and credit card at the door). This will eliminate the scalper / ticket broker resales. Personally, I think that's a really cool thing.

How can a show be "SOLD OUT" on the site at 4:15 with tix still available for purchase through the same site at 5pm?

I also was unable to buy tix, based my whole day around it, Screw Ramshead, I will never go to a showthere, Unacceptable.

I've seen the Beastie Boys a few times. They are definitely fun to watch on stage. I wish I was going to Bonnaroo this year. I'm gonna catch the special on them this Sunday on Fuse at 6pm I think? It's a special that is highlighting all of their hits from their concert at MSG. i found it here too: Beastie Boys

my friend who works at RHL (who was unable to put me on his guest list due to the fact that they cant have one) said that they had over 10,000 hits in 5 mins. It caused the system to crash. I had an account set up prior to buying the tix but I had nooo luck. However I do have good friends who did get lucky and they are taking me! MIX MASTER MIKE and I will be reunited. Hollar!

Looks like scoring tickets for this show is slight better than winning the lottery.
What happened to doing little things like adding another show when the demand is this high.
I guess they mustn’t think enough of their fans than schedule more than one show per stop.
I’m impressed, and not in a good way.

GDA, wrote: "I'm impressed, and not in a good way."

You have got to be kidding me! For years, gorilla-style shows have been a staple of the music industry. The Stones did it, Hendrix did it, The Beatles did it, along with countless other bands. This is not a "stop". This is a quick, one-hitter gorilla show to get them back into form before jumping into massive shows like Bonaroo and Lollapalooza. It'd be different if this were a concert tour.

I can't lie, the way Ramshead did things was backwards, but hopefully they've gotten some lessons learned from this experience (e.g. rent space on additional servers to handle the bandwidth issues of a 10,000+ people hitting a site that is only built to handle general lineup inquiries), but don't take it out on the Beasties. Out of all the other cities, they've chosen to come here and put on a show for Baltimore. No matter what, not everyone was going to get to go, no matter how many shows they had or how large a venue they played.

This is a good sign for Baltimore, getting an act like this over New York, Philly, or DC (although, they most likely through DC out of the mix due to the fact they played there at election time). Jesus people, be happy for what you've got for once rather than start immediately hating.

@GDA -
What an ignorant thing to say about a band that is playing a suprise show in a tiny venue they have no business playing in to begin with. God Bless the Beastie Boys for still doing these things for their fans. They could have played a huge arena and sold 10,00 tickets, but instead they drop a surprise show at a club that holds about 400 people.
You said: "What happened to doing little things like adding another show when the demand is this high.
I guess they mustn’t think enough of their fans than schedule more than one show per stop," which was an ignorant thing to say on a lot of levels. The Beastie Boys could add ten consecutive shows at Ram's Head an they would all sell-out. Perhaps you aren't familiar with the venue, but it isn't the kind of place the usually hosts a band this large. This show was a surprise, it is not as if this stop in Baltimore is part of a large scale tour.

@Neighbor
You said, "How can a show be "SOLD OUT" on the site at 4:15 with tix still available for purchase through the same site at 5pm?" Well, apparently you don't know how the interwebs work. When the show was actually listed as "Sold Out", what it really meant was that all tickets had been put on reserve. For any number or reasons (perhaps a declined credit card or dropped internet connection), some of the tickets people reserved at 4 o'clock were never purchased. These tickets were then re-released for sale when they became available. Like everyone else, I was very upset to see the show "Sold Out" when the page finally loaded. However, I persistently refreshed the page for 45 minutes until some tickets freed up. Perhaps if some of you had been more patient you wouldn't find yourselves complaining.

Well Dylan, no, I didn't know how that worked, so thank you for your answer to my question. It reached me all the way down here where I live, under your pedestal.

Yes, they real do SO much for their fans, starting with the Ram's Head performance and ending with Austin City Limits Festival 10/02/2009), they have scheduled 9 performances ( http://beastieboys.com/tour/ ) . How about a real tour instead if a handful on commando attacks?.
This outfit during an interview for their 2007 tour made a point of saying how they want to play more "intimate" venues, apparently not more often.
I remember that bands would include in their touring would play two or more nights at a venue and on occasion add a show if the demand was high enough as well as the occasional guerrilla or unscheduled performance.

@everyone complaining about the fact that they didn't get tickets

and

@GDA who complained they they only have 9 scheduled tour dates.

The Beastie Boys will have a large scale tour following the release of their new album in the fall. Chill out and wait and I'm sure they will come back around by this year's end. They are playing festivals for the summer and saving the "tour" for the fall. If you are such a die-hard, then come to one of the multiple festivals at which they will be performing. There are still tix for Bonnaroo left; I'll be there for sure.

Like I said, Beasties could play 10 shows at Ram's Head and they would still all sell-out. There is no way to satisfy demand for a show like this at such a tiny venue. Stop complaining. This was a surprise show - a "bonus", if you will. It wouldn't be such a special occasion if they were doing 3 night runs at tiny club across the country.

I haven't seen the Beasties live since Hurricane was their DJ. I'm really hoping Mixmaster Mike will be there tonight. Not only are the Beasties one of the most influencial bands of all times, Mixmaster Mike is also one of the top DJ's in the world.

Dylan - good points, but I think the Rams Head Live holds about 1,800, not 400 people.