A list of things cheaper than seeing U2 at the big sphere thing

If you have a cool couple of grand just burning a hole in your pocket, allow me to suggest some alternate purchases.

You’ve probably heard by now that Las Vegas, the restrained good taste capital of the world, is now the home of the Sphere, a massive concert venue with an LED screen exterior so large it can be seen from space. Depending on what’s programmed on the screen, the Sphere might look like a giant basketball, or a winking emoji looming over the entire city as if to remind you that, indeed, what happens there stays there. It’s undoubtedly an exasperating eyesore for anyone who lives there, but for tourists and outsiders, it’s pretty neat looking.

It’s even cooler on the inside. With a capacity of 20,000 people, it has a wraparound 16K LED screen, a sound system consisting of over 1,500 speakers, and immersive 4D features, including scents and wind. Christening the Sphere is U2, performing a 25 concert run of Achtung Baby in its entirety.

Tickets start at $450. Or they might be $900, or $1,250, it changes depending on what day and where you look. At any of those prices, there’s a very high chance that you’ll probably be standing the whole time, or sitting so far away that you’ll have to resort to looking at that enormous LED screen to keep up with what’s happening on stage. Because most people wanting to see the show will be coming from another city, you’ll need to get a hotel suite. Travel packages start at $720 a person, and that’s before you buy both your concert ticket, and your airline ticket. Round trip airfare from New York City (where I live) to Las Vegas currently averages at around $250, though that fluctuates on a near-daily basis, and may require you to change planes in some route that doesn’t make sense, like Minneapolis or Portland.

Grand total at the absolute baseline prices¹, without factoring in food, taxes or other incidental costs: $1,420 per person. Or it could be as high as $2,500. For approximately two hours of entertainment.

“But Gena,” you might be thinking, “It’s an experience. You’re paying for the experience.” And it’s certainly an experience I would love to, uh, experience. Though I haven’t kept up with much of their new music over the past decade, U2 is my favorite band. In fact, I have seen them live, twice, and they put on an incredible show. That being said, short of David Bowie and Prince descending from Heaven to tour together, I cannot imagine any circumstance in which I would be willing to spend that much of my own money on a single concert.

Now you might be thinking “Uh oh, someone’s jealous,” which yes, of course I’m jealous. Obviously I’m jealous. But I’m also dismayed: in a time when everything — housing, groceries, utilities, clothes, entertainment — seems to cost twice as much as it did less than a decade ago, concerts have, like theme parks, become an activity limited largely to the upper class. Slate ran an article last week written by a woman who bought four $800 tickets to Taylor Swift’s “Eras” tours, then resold them at $5,000 each. She expresses shock at how reselling the tickets “made her rich,” while evidently ignoring the fact that if she was able to drop $3,200 on concert tickets² she already wasn’t doing too bad to begin with.

As the concept of “middle class” continues to disappear, and people no longer have any idea what class level they’re in (or are in denial about it), no one acknowledges that being able to have these “experiences” without it putting a significant dent in your finances is the very definition of “privileged.” $3,200 is more than many Americans earn per month. Even taking it back down to $1,500, the minimum amount it would take to travel to see U2 perform in a big glowy ball, that’s no chump change either. We’re in an era where people are forced to pay $800,000 for a two bedroom house missing half its roof and partially submerged in a Superfund swamp, nothing having to do with money makes sense anymore and it’s all very depressing.

If someone were to hand you $1,500 right now, you should grab it and run immediately, because a bank robbery is probably in progress. Then, if you’re not a U2 fan³, consider these other frivolous things you could buy with that money:

• Admission for 150 people to the Mystery Hole in Fayetteville, West Virginia (hold your high school reunion there!)

• A starting bid on a jacket Prince wore during his Musicology tour

• 25,000 tiny plastic babies

• 10 days worth of Cameos from actor Larry Thomas, a/k/a “the Soup Nazi” from Seinfeld

• 2 Prada nylon visors (for the fashionable fry cook)

• This velvet painting of a topless “island girl,” with some change left over to buy this velvet painting of the Devil sitting on a toilet

• 120 cans of pork brains⁴ (with milk gravy)

• 5,555 Chicken McNuggets

• 10 days at the world-famous Clown Motel (tax not include)

• 2 of these bitchin’ leopard coffee tables

• Pay in advance to have the KISS logo applied to your casket so you can rock ‘n’ roll all night and party every day in Heaven

• Or, y’know, you could use it to pay off a bill. That would be nice.

1. Which, again, appear to change on a day to day basis.

2. She also casually mentions that she was planning to fly out her sister and niece to attend the show, again, like it’s nothing.

3. Or if you are but don’t want to see them play without drummer Larry Mullin, Jr., who’s recovering from a health issue.

4. Some quick, terrifying math concludes that the cholesterol content of this purchase totals 135,000 milligrams.