Area U2 Fans

Area U2 fans who joined the band's fan club (for $40) at www.u2.com in order to get "preferred access" to "some of the best seats available" for the March 28 Vertigo tour opener at the Sports Arena show say they're pissed.

"They gave me a six-number priority code when I joined," says Sandra Cross, guitarist for Ocean Beach--based group Xlent. "It took until almost noon before I could bring up a page...then, I finally enter my priority code, and the page blanks out! I re-entered the information and was told, 'Your code has already been used!' "

Arthur Fogel, president of Clear Channel Entertainment's TNA Productions division (which is promoting the Vertigo tour), says, "I spoke to the Ticketmaster people on Tuesday, and they reported over two million hits within a very short period of time...obviously this caught everybody off guard, and everything possible is being done to make sure people are satisfied."

Advancetickets.com currently has section LL2 fifth-row seats for $1190. (Face value is $165.) This, despite a presale warning on the U2 website reading, "Scalpers be warned.... When we identify rogue U2.com subscribers...we are taking action to cancel the sale of those tickets and to redistribute those tickets to subscribers who have yet to get tickets."

An additional San Diego date has been added for March 30.