Radiohead Raised Over 500,000 Dollars For Haiti
By Seraphina L.
When Radiohead announced how they were going to take a day out of recording time (for their upcoming album) to fly back to Los Angeles and do a benefit show for Haiti relief fund on Sunday night, many publications, including us, jumped on the chance to report it. However, it wasn’t just any regular concert. In order to go to this Radiohead show at The Henry Fonda this past weekend, you had to bid for your ticket.
According to the Associated Press, attendees included more than a handful of celebrities on the general admission floor but those who were just die-hard fans of Radiohead didn’t seem to think anything less about the event.
Radiohead raised over $500,000 with this auction-based concert, and we have to say we knew it was going to work. There were attendees who paid up to $4,000 for a pair of tickets and although we knew what the purpose behind that was, even Thom Yorke joked about the high prices when he asked the audience, “What did you do to get a ticket? Get money from your dad? Or blackmail your boss?”
The lowest price for a pair of tickets went for $475 and those who were gracious enough to lend the money got to see the infamous band play hits such as “Fake Plastic Trees,” “Paranoid Android,” “Lucky” and “The Bends.”
Other ways Oxfam raised money including limited-edition posters that went for $25 each. Oxfam volunteers collected cash donations dropped into green buckets at the theater’s entrance as well.
The AP reports attendance from celebrities such as Justin Timberlake, Jessica Biel, Charlize Theron, Anna Paquin and Daniel Craig. However, there were many die-hard Radiohead fans who also did anything the could to attend the special one-time event.
A Sacramento resident drove all six hours after finding a plus-one on Craigslist (tickets were only sold in pairs to encourage higher bids), even though he had already seen Radiohead 15 times. A San Diego resident bid for days to get his $475 ticket and although he wasn’t able to pay as much as a celebrity, his statement about the show was one of the ones that mattered the most: “[I would've spent] whatever it took to see such a beautiful band do such a beautiful thing.”
We definitely agree with that.
Were you at the Radiohead Benefit show on Sunday? How did you feel about that experience?
