Fans of the Eagles hoping to see the soft-rock legends play their first new music in three decades will get the chance at an exclusive concert in London — if they are willing to pay more than £1,000 for the privilege.

Tickets for the concert, which takes place in London at the of the month, come in several classes — the “gold circle package”, which includes a front-row ticket, is a snip at £950 plus VAT. Other tickets offered at £575 and £475 plus VAT.

Frustratingly, none of the 2,000 tickets will go on sale to the general public. Most will be offered to corporate clients by “invitation only” while others will be given out to competition-winners, record-label employees and the media. Those who do go will receive “full hospitality” — including free drinks and meals and commemorative merchandise — as part of the event.

Demand for tickets will be high, with the band releasing their new album, Long Road Out of Eden, only two days before the event. It is the first release of all-new music by the band in 28 years. As a result, the lucky few to attend the concert will be the first people outside the United States to hear the new material live.

The ticket prices dwarf those paid for other A-list pop and rock artists in Britain. The best seats at Madonna’s performance at Wembley Arena last summer cost £160. Earlier this year, more than a million people clamoured for seats — costing up to £125 — for the forthcoming Led Zeppelin reunion. Glastonbury disposed of its 135,000 weekend passes for this year’s event within two hours — taking more than £21 million in the process.

Only Barbra Streisand comes close to rivalling the band. Fans paid a reported $2,500 a head (about £1,200) to see her at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas on the eve of the millennium.

David Jensen, the breakfast-show presenter at Gold Radio, said: “The prices are unbelievable. I like the Eagles a lot, but whether I like them enough to pay £950 for a front-row seat, I don’t know.

“This particular opportunity will give Eagles fans — or at least the corporate fans — the first opportunity to hear new material from the new, highly anticipated, album. There are very few bands in the world that can command this kind of attention."

Barney Hoskyns, author of Hotel California, a book about the folk-rock era, said that he thought fans would grudgingly pay the high prices to see such a concert. He said: “The babyboomer generation who grew up listening to the Eagles expect to pay silly money to see them, so it doesn't surprise me in the least. I'm sure there will be takers.”

The band split up in 1980 but reunited 14 years later. They have toured intermittently ever since. Their present line-up is Glenn Frey, Don Henley, Joe Walsh and Timothy B. Schmit, and the band last released a studio album of new songs, The Long Run, in 1979.

Their greatest hits album sold more than 29 million copies in the US, according to Universal, breaking records.

At the peak of their fame the West Coast band had great commercial success in this country as well as the United States. Eight of their singles and seven of their albums reached the British charts. The Eagles have sold about 120 million albums worldwide.

–– The Eagles will play Indigo O2 in Greenwich, South East London, on October 31.

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