Sold-Out Stones? That's Old News

For Those Without Tickets, Here's 10 Younger-Skewing Acts Worth Catching

October is Ticket Scalpers' Month.

We know this not because Hallmark has declared it so, but because of the MCI Center concert schedule.

Oct. 3, Rolling Stones, SOLD OUT.

Oct. 8, Paul McCartney, SOLD OUT.

Oct. 19 and 20, U2, SOLD OUT.

So, three of the biggest rock tours of 2005 are swinging through town -- and you misfortunate, ticketless souls whose lives will be horribly incomplete without catching the rock gods in concert had better consult your financial advisers before you talk to the scalpers and brokers. Because you're going to pay dearly for secondary-market ducats.

While there are some decent deals to be found, particularly on Craigslist.org, the brokers are having something of a field day. For instance, Great Seats, a College Park-based ticket brokerage, is charging $1,950 for a third-row floor seat at the McCartney show. Want to sit just to the side of the Stones' stage, in the lower level? It'll cost you $845 to $880 per ticket. And the lowest Great Seats price to see U2: Just $525, is all.

Not that the tickets were bargains to begin with.

Top seats at the U2 shows were list-priced at $163. McCartney's went for an MSRP of $253. And the Stones charged $63 for the MCI Center cheap seats , with the best tickets going for a face value of $403.

"Mi$$ You," indeed.

Meanwhile, here are 10 other shows you ought not to miss over the coming months.

M.I.A. at the 9:30 club, Sept. 21: M.I.A. is Maya Arulpragasam, a Sri Lankan-born Londoner whose father was a Tamil Tiger revolutionary and whose debut album, "Arular," is kooky, chaotic, excessively eclectic, often nonsensical -- and brilliant. It's an addictive sociopolitical firebomb of a party soundtrack that's not unlike your car radio on auto-search, jumping from one sound (electro-funk) to another (bhangra beat) and then another (old-school hip-hop). Similarly, Arulpragasam's singsongy vocals race from pure gibberish to childish wordplay to calls for revolution justlikethat. As engaging as she is in recorded form, M.I.A. is even more thrilling live.