"You could have paid half -- well, no, a third -- of your S.F. rent with what it cost to be here! Thank you very much!"

The Rolling Stones are in the Bay Area this week, biding time between their show at the Oracle Arena and Wednesday's at HP Pavilion. Since Sunday's disappointing performance is still fresh in our minds, we thought we'd compare it to a similar, highly desired, pricey status symbol for Bay Area residents: A San Francisco address. Here are the top eight ways that going to a Rolling Stones concert is like living in San Francisco.

See also: The Rolling Stones Overcharge For Imperfection at Oracle Arena, 5/5/13

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Brian Rasic

How much is too much to see the 'Stones?

How much will you pay to say you've seen the Rolling Stones?

In 30 years, when Mick Jagger and Keith Richards are either dead and buried, or are liquid-preserved human heads running a cybernetic body, how badly will you want to tell your (grand-) kids that yes, you saw the real Rolling Stones live?

Will it be worth $170 for nosebleed seats at the top of HP Pavilion in San Jose -- facing the back quarter of the stage? Would you pay $450 to sit one level down, still in a side-facing section? What about $623 to get a floor seat two dozen rows back from the stage? Or $1,500, to be very close, in the Tongue Pit?

Because that's what it will cost when tickets -- to what may be the Rolling Stones' last two Bay Area shows ever, on May 5 and May 8 -- go onsale to the general public at 10 a.m. today. Even a seat in the upper deck at HP, clear on the other end of the arena from the stage, will run you $272. (Prices for the Oracle show on May 5 are similar, or a few dollars more.)

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Funny or Die

Remember that scene in American Psycho where Patrick Bateman extolls the virtues of the Bay Area's Huey Lewis and the News, just before pounding an axe through the cranium of Jared Leto? Yeah, of course you do -- and if you don't, well, it doesn't really matter: this clip of Huey and Al re-enacts it almost to a movement. Only it's funnier than the original. If you've ever wanted to watch Weird Al suffer a brutal end at the hands of an '80s pop-rock singer from San Francisco, here's your chance!

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Perhaps, as Morrissey once sang, "Sorry Doesn't Help" -- but the singer is going to try anyway. Acknowledging for the first time the six Bay Area concerts he's cancelled in a row, Morrissey today announced plans for a month-long live residency in San Francisco this summer.

"Dear San Francisco, I'm sorry ... I'm feeling better, and I'll do my best to play for you this time," the England-born, Los Angeles-based former Smiths singer said in a statement, alluding to his recent health problems. "We shall be together for a whole month -- as long as you keep the smell of burning animals away."

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Michelle Shocked showed up in Santa Cruz to play Moe's Alley last night -- dressed all in white (maybe as a condom?) with a number of cryptic sayings written on her front and back. And since her gig had been cancelled in the wake of the homophobic rant she went on in San Francisco more than a week ago, Shocked simply sat outside the club, playing her guitar.

Shocked you will remember, told a Yoshi's crowd on March 17 that "God hates fags" -- words that promptly echoed throughout Twitter and resulted in the cancellation of nearly all of the gigs on her current tour. As our guest writer Lori Selke pointed out, it was just one more bizarre episode of self-destruction and in Shocked's wholly confusing career.

See also:
* Michelle Shocked's Short Rise and Long, Confounding Fall
* Michelle Shocked Concerts Canceled Nationwide After Anti-Gay Tirade in SF

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The crowd Phoenix drew at Outside Lands in 2010 -- much larger than will fit inside the Independent.

Today, at about 11 a.m., the folks at the the Independent announced that French electro-rockers Phoenix will be playing the venue this Monday, April 1 -- and that the $45 tickets were going on sale at noon. Three years ago, Phoenix packed the Polo Fields at Golden Gate Park for a mid-afternoon set on the main stage of Outside Lands. So how fast did the band burn through the Independent's 500-person capacity?

"Instantly," says a spokesperson for Another Planet Entertainment, which manages the Independent. But how instantly? Live 105 Music Director Aaron Axelsen put the figure at 10 measly seconds. Which is rather more quickly than Dave Chappelle managed to sell out either the Independent or the Chapel for any of his four shows this week. (Chappelle, of course, also comes to the Bay Area way more often than Phoenix.)

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Purple Pain. twitter.com/CaptainKDougla...

— Kirk Douglas (@CaptainKDouglas) March 2, 2013

Prince is a dick. The litte guy just goes around the planet doing whatever he wants like some kind of mischievous, tiny demigod. Case in point: His recent appearance on Late Night With Jimmy Fallon. Here's the story: Prince shows up to rehearse in preparation for his appearance promoting his new album, 3rd Eye Girl. Prince spots a beautiful 1961 Epiphone owned by Captain Kirk Douglas, guitar player for The Roots, and asks if he may play it during his performance on that evening's show. Now this is Kirk's favorite guitar, his baby. In every interview he talks about this guitar and how it's like a part of him, and in any other circumstance we're going to guess that he would flat-out refuse to let someone else borrow this precious guitar. But this is Prince we are talking about. So Kirk lends him the axe.

Prince proceeds to play two songs on the show He starts with new single "Screwdriver," but then busts into his classic, heavy-as-fuck track "Bambi" from his second 1979 self-titled album. Prince nails it, and his solo at the end was one of the most powerful we've seen him do on TV. And then he pulls the dick move of the century.

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"Yeah, I'm thinkin' about it..."

Update: 3/9/13: Morrissey has postponed tonight's show due to illness. (Seriously.) The show will now be May 1.

Original post: Your morning headlines: Forty-seven airplanes landed safely at San Francisco International yesterday. Muni ushered people around the city on time, with zero service interruptions. No iPhones were stolen in the Tenderloin. And, in entertainment news, former Smiths singer Morrissey is still scheduled to play a sold-out show tomorrow, Saturday, March, 9, at the Regency Ballroom. As of press time, no changes, cancelations, postponements, or vegan-diet-based demands have been made. (As far as we know.)

See also:
* Dear Morrissey, Will You Ever Actually Make it to San Francisco?
* Morrissey Has Canceled This Sunday's Show at Davies Symphony Hall, Of Course

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[Editor's note: The following post by Houston writer and ESL teacher Shea Serrano was named the best blog post of the year in the first-ever Voice Media Group music writing awards. Originally published by our sister blog at LA Weekly, It's a sidesplitting minute-by-minute account of an afternoon he spent chaperoning a junior high dance. Read more about the VMG music writing awards here.]

By SHEA SERRANO

1:04 pm: In about 25 minutes, I'm going to be chaperoning a middle school dance. The dance is for the school's graduating 8th graders, of which there are several hundred. I've probably chaperoned fifteen of these things already. It's like being a bouncer at a night club, except this party will take place in a cafeteria and nobody told me not to let in Black or Mexican people.

1:08: Oh shit. They're serving free cake at this dance. That's actually kind of great. There'd probably be less hostility at proper night clubs if they gave away cake, right? Once when I was in a club, I got into a bit of a tiff with a gentleman. Shortly thereafter I snuck up behind him on the dance floor and punched him in his ear as hard as I could. I'm almost certain that wouldn't have happened if I'd had a slice of Italian Cream Cake on a Styrofoam plate in my hands. Fuck your nightclub for not serving cake, yo.

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The Residents

Anyone familiar with the Residents expects a particularly thorough brand of mind-fuckery from the San Francisco musicians/art-misfits. But there's mind-fuckery, and then there's selling a giant box set that comes in an honest-to-god refrigerator. For $100,000.

That's what the Residents are proposing to do come Christmas Day. Starting Dec. 25, the group is putting 10 editions of its Ultimate Box Set up for sale, each of which includes a copy of seemingly every Residents release ever, plus an eyeball mask (more on that later), and a mystery item reportedly "worth" $5 million.

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