Ever wonder how ticket scalpers -- excuse me, ticket brokers -- always seem to wind up with all the best tickets for the big shows? Well, here's your answer: TicketBots.net, an online retailer where your wildest front-row dreams can be had starting for about $750, which will get you web-robot software capable of scooping up scalpable golden-circle seats by the bushel.

I'd like to tell you more about this site, such as who runs it and what, other than buying up blocks of tickets to scalp, one might use such a product for. But when I sent a message identifying myself as a newspaper reporter who covers the ticket-scalping industry, the agent on duty wrote back the following reply:

I don't think, I can help you with anything here..

Now that is a pity...

Onetime Chapel Hill regular Ben Folds is coming back to his old stomping grounds this spring, to play two shows with the NC Symphony. The pianist will be at Raleigh's Meymandi Concert Hall March 22-23, with associate conductor Sarah Hicks -- and word is that they'll do two different concert programs, not the same program repeated two nights. Ticket prices are still to come, but The public on-sale date is Feb. 6. This will be Folds' first show in the area since that fabulous Ben Folds Five reunion in Chapel Hill in the fall of 2008.

UPDATE: Ticket prices are $28, $37, $63 and $79.

WHOOPS: And it turns out that Folds played DPAC in 2009 and did an NC Symphony gig in 2010; so this will actually be his third show in the area since the 2008 Ben Folds Five reunion (thanks, Eric and Valerie).

When it comes to multi-disciplinary collaborations, it always helps things along if artists from different worlds hit it off on a personal level. And that's definitely what happened when Green Day guitarist Billie Joe Armstrong met Broadway director Michael Mayer while they were putting together the stage-musical version of "American Idiot." In no time at all, they were singing show tunes together.

"It was at a diner on Ninth Avenue," Mayer said in a recent interview. "The whole band was there, and Green Day is really [expletive] famous. They're not the sort of band that's going to be in a diner in New York's theater district in the middle of the afternoon too often. But there we were, singing 'Together, Wherever We Go.'"

At this point, Mayer paused to warble a bit of the song made famous by Ethel Merman in 1959's "Gypsy": We may not go far/But sure as a star/Wherever we are/It's together.

"Yes, between Billie Joe's androgyny and [drummer] Tre Cool's pink boa and tasteful pumps, Green Day's always been very campy," Mayer continued. "The whole thing was so much fun. I knew that, in some weird way, this was a soul mate. It was a beautiful thing."

There is an "American Idiot" movie in the works. Meantime, however, the touring version of the musical opens at Raleigh's Memorial Auditorium on Tuesday. For lots more on that (including the local member of the stage band), see the story in Sunday's paper. The first two rows in the pit have been designated as "student rush tickets" for each "American Idiot" performance, available only the night of the show for $26. A student ID is required.

ADDENDUM (2/2/12): Roy Dicks' review.

Not that it’s unusual to encounter Bob Dylan songs, but I still felt like the man’s songs were following me around on Friday night. Driving from Raleigh to Chapel Hill, I heard Peter Paul & Mary’s version of “Don’t Think Twice, It’s All Right” on WKIX-AM. After that signal faded out, I switched over to WXYC on the FM band just in time to hear Van Morrison’s rendition of “It’s All Over Now, Baby Blue.” Then I walked into Cat’s Cradle, where Old 97’s were playing, and they served up “Champaign, Illinois” – a rewrite of Dylan’s “Desolation Row.”

While it’s hard to argue with those other two covers, I think I dug the 97’s remake the most. There might not be a more purely likable act on the bar-band circuit nowadays, and they’ve gotten nothing but better since their mid-’90s breakthrough period.

Speaking of the mid-’90s, frontman Rhett Miller does not appear to have aged 15 minutes in the 17 years since the 97’s debuted with 1995’s “Wreck Your Life” (an album represented Friday night by a rollicking run-through of “Doreen”). Miller’s stage persona is the lovable loser who wishes he were cooler, but he’ll settle for knowing where you’ve been. And even if you’re not telling, well, he’ll still leave the back door open for ya.

The rest of the 97’s were all beyond solid, too, still rocking at the feverish pace of a runaway train (no, that name has never been an accident). They were great, and it was a surprisingly full house given that the 97’s are touring on an album that’s six months old. All in all, a real good night…

We don't have dates yet, but we do have acts for the big 2012 arena-country shows at Raleigh's Time Warner Warner Cable Music Pavilion at Walnut Creek. And let's just say that, aside from the first two acts listed, this year's schedule is mighty heavy on The Usual Suspects (and is actually most notable for who isn't on it, at least not yet):

(UPDATE -- dates have been added...)

Sugarland (April 28)
Lady Antebellum, Darius Rucker, Thompson Square (June 8)
Toby Keith (July 15)
Jason Aldean, Luke Bryan (July 27)
Rascal Flatts, Little Big Town, Eli Young Band, Edens Edge (Aug. 10)
Brad Paisley, The Band Perry (Aug. 24)

These six shows go on sale Feb. 3 as part of the venue's annual "country megaticket" package at prices from $129 to $649.

Well, the good news is that Bruce Springsteen's U.S. tour includes a North Carolina date. But the bad news is that said date ain't here in the Raleigh-Durham-Chapel Hill vicinity. It's over in the Triad, March 19 at Greensboro Coliseum. On-sale date for those who want to make the trek is Feb. 3.
 

I was recently perusing the Durham Performing Arts Center website to check the date on a concert, when I saw something I hadn't noticed before. Tucked into the bottom of almost every listing was this notice:

NOTICE OF PROHIBITION OF ONLINE RESALE OF ADMISSION TICKETS
Pursuant to §14-344.1(b) of the General Statutes of North Carolina, the Durham Performing Arts Center has filed a notice with the NC Secretary of State prohibiting the Online Resale of Admission Tickets to this event.

This goes back to a story I wrote last year, about parasites -- broker sites that try to pass themselves off as venue websites, even though they're populated by scalpers selling tickets well above face price. After that story ran, DPAC management met with the Secretary of State's office and decided to give prohibiting online resales a try. So far, it's working at least some of the time.

"We filed our first prohibitions early last fall," says DPAC general manager Bob Klaus. "We tested five shows and to our amazement, many of the biggest ticket re-selling sites dropped those listings."

Brokers, of course, don't agree that this is a good thing. The argument for "secondary market sales" is that it's classic free-market economics based on supply and demand. The ticket-broker industry's position is that attempts to regulate ticket resales are misguided and even counterproductive.

"You can't regulate the resale of tickets," declares Gary Adler, general counsel for the Washington, D.C.-based National Association of Ticket Brokers. "If you try and make restrictions, you are limiting the amount of tickets in the market. The secondary market when it's open and free is a beautiful thing, it puts tickets into people's hands at a fair market price. Maybe that's more than face value, but that's the band's fault for not having more accurate information about what they should be charging."

Whether you agree or disagree with that viewpoint, it's an issue that won't be going away anytime soon. In fact, you can probably count on the NATB lobbying the North Carolina legislature about amending this law before too long. For more, see the story in Sunday's paper.

Well, shoot. In today's paper, you'll find an interview with Simone Dinnerstein; and below is the blog post I prepared to go with it (under the headline, "Strange yet cool collaborations: Simone Dinnerstein and Tift Merritt"). Alas, Dinnerstein has had to postpone her show scheduled for tonight due to illness. The rescheduled date is March 2.

Last time she played Durham, classical pianist Simone Dinnerstein shared the stage with Tift Merritt in an intriguing cross-genre collaboration. They'll work together again this summer with an album project. Meantime, Dinnerstein and Merritt have separate albums on tap. Dinnerstein's "Something Almost Being Said" comes out next week, and Merritt is in the midst of recording the followup to 2010's "See You on the Moon" now.

"I'm really excited, I've got a neat cast coming in," Merritt said shortly before recording was to begin. "It's close enough that I don't want to jinx it by saying anything, but I'm excited. I'm making this one myself with Tucker Martine producing, and Marc Ribot will play guitar. It's been kind of wonderful to be at the helm in an even deeper way than before."

Dinnerstein also plays tonight at Duke.

The RBC Center won't be called that for too much longer, but the Raleigh arena just announced a mighty big show. Elton John will play there on March 16, right about the time the building's name change to PNC Arena is supposed to take effect. Tickets start at $37 and go on-sale Jan. 27.

Last week, Loretta Lynn's Triangle show was rescheduled to April because she's recovering from knee surgery. And now, the Red Hot Chili Peppers' Jan. 27 show at RBC Center has also been postponed to the same month, also due to a lower-body surgical situation.

The Chili Peppers' new date will be April 4. In a statement, tour promoter Live Nation said the show was  postponed because lead singer Anthony Kiedis recently had to undergo surgery because of "multiple foot injuries," adding that he is expected to make a fully recovery. Also rescheduled are dates in Charlotte, to April 6; and Greensboro, to April 9.