26/08/2024
KIRK Franklin and Maverick City ( Manchester UK) event put on by Kingdom World Tours..Review
Firstly , let me say that I've been to many concerts in my life and also seen many artists at this venue- A O Arena ( formally known as M.E.N Arena or Nynex Arena depending on how old you are..)
This Categorically was the worst organised event I have ever been to on this magnitude.
Let me explain...I had to wait to sleep on this Review to ensure my boujie musicgeek standards were not an influence on what I wanted to say...but Alas these people have really took people many and RAN..
It all started when the event was announced and registration took place via the kingdom world tour website . Registered, then was informed of how to purchase tickets. Followed instructions and bingo! Got confirmation email with said tickets attached..this was APRIL 2024. The tickets said...' This is your ticket for event, please print or use from phone upon entry'. I had bought VIP seating tickets to guarantee a decent seat . The tickets were billed as Standing, Seating and VIP seating.
OK, so no issues until I attended a family function the day before event and was asked by a friend those dreaded word..'Soph, did you see the email?. Perplexed, I took a look..The Organisers had sent an email that morning saying our tickets were not valid..and that we NOW had to ensure we were at the venue to exchange said tickets for 4:30 pm ! Doors open for concert at 6pm...
Fuming! But tried to keep Demure and Mindful 😁...went along.
Arrived and got my tickets just after 5pm..the ticket administrator didn't have a clue and was just giving out tickets not looking at seating plan , and was extremely chaotic.
Anyway I ran home to get the others and we returned about 730. On arrival we got in and it was then we realised our tickets had nothing VIP about them, in fact we could not access the seating. The seats were over in Yonder!
It then transpired that they had misold the seating, used their website initially to buy tickets then changed to ticketmaster half way through sales so allocations were all messed up for those of us who bought early bird tickets.
The worst thing about it, there was no representation from Kingdom World Tour to remedy this mess up..
We ended up a guest services where there was a long line of people in the eact same position.
I have to say the staff at the arena were exemplary and worked hard to try and help, but hands were tied as these fraudulent organisers were just licky licky and making change off people by cutting corners and not giving the service paid for...in my head I'm thinking is this grounds for another PPI claim, cos this was surely misold
One person said it was like trying to arrange a champagne service on a vimto budget. ...another said she was calling the police!!
So the lovely lady at guest services tried to help my sisters and I and gave us disabled access seats, only thing is now this is at the very back of stadium so couldn't see a thing..and there were no screens ( in the big big arena) and were Not the VIP seats we had paid for.
The concert itself
The Sound was terrible! So much so that Kirk put them on blast, ( pardon the pun).
Not sure if they even had a sound check if I'm honest as the timing was just off.
The running of the set was just all over the place as if it their first gig. We know they have songs for day and some real saangers, but the whole set up was fueled on folks emotions, and at one stage they were asking the crowd, what shall we sing/ what you wanna hear.'.Hello Dahlin...this isn't karaoke .
And of course if your favourite song was being sung you forgot all about the poor experience you had received.
Listen some of my people were so upset then left half way through.
Some didn't even bother come after the queuing for ticket at 4:30 debacle.
Meet and Greet
Well I didn't book meet and greet but heard it was fraudulent. I just landed another person's experience I Johannesburg earlier in month and blow by blow the same thing!! Which means this poor organisation is a running them . .. ( I will put their reviews in comments to read for yourselves)
I am yet to hear from organisers my request of a full refund. ..stay tuned for update.
We want Justice!!!
MusicGeek
