Beating the odds for BTS tickets

When it was time to book seats for the group's concerts, it all came down to 99% luck and 1% perspiration

THE moment my transaction went through, I felt like I had won the lottery. With more than one million people trying to get BTS concert tickets, Lady Luck was certainly on my side last Thursday morning.

Back in January, I wrote about the Arirang World Tour by BTS – the world’s biggest music group comprising seven amazingly talented South Korean men – following their return from mandatory military service.

As a long-time fan, I was determined to attend at least one of their concerts that would cover 34 cities in 23 countries. First choice was, of course, the Kuala Lumpur shows, followed by the ones in Singapore and Sydney, where I had family to bunk in with.

The pre-sale of tickets for the group’s fans, called ARMY, for the concerts in Kuala Lumpur, Singapore, Melbourne and Sydney was held on June 4. Millions of us prepared for the event like we were embarking on a military operation.

To qualify for the pre-sale, I renewed my ARMY membership in January that cost US$22 (about RM90).

As the sale date loomed, I registered with Live Nation, the authorised ticketing site.

In this war for seats, I would be competing with thousands of younger, far more tech-savvy fans, so strategy would be key to my success. This ahjumma spent hours watching YouTube videos and consulting AI for advice.

Speed was most important because you had only 10 minutes to complete your purchase.

Any delay could mean being booted out of the site and getting to the back of the virtual queue.

With that in mind, I pored over the seat map for TM National Stadium to figure out which seats to aim for and wrote out a list of my ARMY membership number and details of my payment me­thods, which were my bank debit card and credit cards.

On the morning of June 4, I set up both my desktop computer and laptop because the more devices, the better my chances.

I waited for the Live Nation website to open the entry zone at 10am to get in the buying queue that would start at 11am.

The moment the countdown on the site’s time counter reached zero, I hit the button to enter in line.

The site had stated that queue places would be randomly assigned, but there was no number given to show me where I was in the queue.

There was only a thin red line on the screen that moved from left to right.

The first update on the site popped up shortly, stating that 1.2 million people were in the queue – it would later rise to 1.3 million – and I still didn’t know where I stood in that virtual red line.

Meanwhile, my two nieces had also logged in – Amy in Sydney and Dianne in Jakarta, where she was accompanying her primary school-age son for a robotics ­competition – and we were checking on each other’s progress on WhatsApp.

Amy had already watched the group’s concert in Las Vegas, and she had such a wonderful time, she ­wanted to go again and again.

She had already secured tickets for Sydney, but she wanted the most expensive seats – the Soundcheck VIP packages – for Melbourne and even KL. More on this later.

At first, the red line moved slowly. I thought it might be a good hour or two before I was at the front of the queue, so I loaded up my laundry, made coffee and checked my email.

But 20 minutes later, the red line on both my PC and laptop had progressed to the halfway mark. That was surprisingly fast.

In contrast, Amy and Dianne’s lines had barely moved. After 40 minutes, I was in to buy from my laptop.

I had initially contemplated buying Soundcheck VIP packages, too.

These are the seats closest to the stage, and ‘soundcheck’ means such VIP ticket holders would be allowed into the stadium earlier to witness the BTS members run through a few songs to test their vocals and stage sound.

Other benefits include access to exclusive merchandise booths before the general public and commemorative lanyards.

Yes, I would have loved to see BTS close-up during their soundcheck, but the seats are flat on ground level with no incline.

And unless you are in the front row, it is likely that the view would be blocked by other fans standing, waving their arms and holding up their mobile phones, signs and light sticks.

As a senior ARMY, I didn’t want to stand up most of the time, looking up at the stage while dodging other fans’ antics. Category one seats were also on flat ground behind the VIP seats.

My best bet was the middle section of category two tickets that had fixed elevated seats facing the stage.

As I searched for seats, I made a stupid mistake. I could have gotten second row seats, but I hesitated, tempted briefly to get category one seats after all.

But those were selling so fast, I could not catch up and when I tried to get back to my second-row seats, they had been taken.

I ended up with seats 12 rows back but still in the middle section facing the stage.

At 11.55am, I completed my purchase, paying RM3,619.40, including fees, for four tickets, or RM904.85 each. Three are for Dianne and her two daughters.

These were the most expensive tickets I ever bought for a concert. The last concert that I went all out for was 30 years ago for Michael Jackson‘s HIStory tour in October 1996 at Stadium Merdeka. That cost me RM300 a seat.

Tickets for his concert were priced from RM65 to RM350 for the most premium VIP seats.

In comparison, the cheapest BTS tickets were priced at RM338 and the Soundcheck VIP seats at RM1,288. Phew!

For general sales the next day, one million people again queued for tickets. According to the TM Stadium Nasional website, there are 85,000 seats.

Let’s assume a total of 170,000 seats were available because the stage is designed to be in the middle of the stadium field with no backdrop blocking a wide section of seats.

If a fan bought an average of two tickets, that means 85,000 people, or about 6.5% out of 1.3 million people, got tickets for the two concerts on Dec 12 and 13.

Against such odds, for me, a fan for 10 years, to be able to fulfil this bucket list wish feels like striking the lottery.

That’s because, despite all that planning, I was just plain lucky to get in fast and buy my tickets. Dianne never got in at all.

But why all the mighty fuss about watching BTS live? Because I have watched them grow up from baby-faced teenagers to mature adults and love their music, their choreography, their personalities, their authenticity, their messages and the plain joy they bring to my life.

And BTS concerts are consistently described as being life-­changing, electrifying, emotional, and a highly communal phenomenon, as seen in the unbelievable ARMY camaraderie that Amy experienced first-hand in Vegas.

It’s still six months before the concert and we pray all goes well.

As I mentioned in my January ­column, hosting BTS in Bukit Jalil is the perfect close to Visit Malaysia 2026 and I also expressed hope that the likes of PAS won’t try to protest their ­coming.

This is especially so when state and general elections are very much in the air and they may think objecting to the concert would be a great vote-wooing ­tactic.

That would be the dumbest thing to do because every city where BTS performed experienced huge economic benefits to local businesses.

And more importantly, BTS fans come from all races and ages, and they are not to be trifled with. So be warned.

I am counting the days to Dec 12, 2026!

The views expressed here are the writer’s own.