A truck parked on the street blared the music of Bono, co-founder of the One Campaign. Searchlights skipped through the night sky. There was a bevy of photographers to photograph celebrities going in a VIP entrance. A line of lucky people wearing concert tickets like credentials around their necks snaked around the block. It wasn’t the usual kind of scene for a Wednesday night in Denver outside the Kanye West concert sponsored by the Recording Industry Association of America, the One Campaign, and a long list of companies.

Shocker: I didn’t get in. Who did: by appearances, lots of young Hill staffers and other politically connected people, judging by the conversations I overheard. Sen. Bob Casey (D-PA) was sighted. He’s gotten nearly $160,000 in campaign contributions from the TV/movies/music industry over the course of his Senate career, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.

The presence of the new ethics law was evident. An event staffer walked back and forth along the line, proclaiming, “If you’re House staff and you haven’t paid, you have to pay at this table.” At the table was a sign with a long legal disclaimer explaining why House staff were required to pay–because the House ethics committee said they did. Senators and Senate staff faced no such requirement. The price for House members and staff: $90 per ticket.

I stood in line with everyone else. When I got to the table, I said who I was–that I was from the Sunlight Foundation, and we were writing about parties this week at the convention, and that I didn’t have a ticket. Could I go in anyway?

“No,” said the staffer, who wouldn’t give his name. “It’s by invitation only.”

“Who is invited to this event?” I asked.

He waved me around the corner to talk to a p.r. person. I gave my name to another staffer, who told me to wait for the One Campaign’s public relations person. I waited for awhile and when he didn’t show, I decided to go home and get some sleep.

The place to be in Denver tonight is this concert featuring Kanye West, sponsored by the Recording Industry Association of America and a long list of companies, as well as the One Campaign. I’m heading there shortly to try my (so far) not so good luck at party crashing.

The Washington Post recently reported the House ethics committee ruled this week that House members and top staff are required to pay $90 apiece for tonight’s concert. However, the Senate committee said that senators and staff can go for free, because the event qualifies as a “widely attended event” under the new ethics law:

At a minimum, ethics lawyers said the industry will have to post signs warning House aides that they must pay the $90 fee and set up a booth to collect the money, or else the industry could face criminal charges from the Justice Department for knowingly giving illegal gifts to congressional staff members.

(Indeed, reported the Post, the House “blue dog” Democrats who attended a party on Sunday night were required to pay $22 apiece. Apparently that party included an open bar and a show by pop rocker KT Tunstall–I wouldn’t know, because a bouncer told me I couldn’t venture on private property.)

As for tonight’s event, of course the RIAA has a big agenda before Congress. The Center for Responsive Politics earlier this year reported how the recording industry is supporting a bill that would make radio broadcasters pay royalties to the recording industry in exchange for playing their songs:

The music industry’s spending is buoyed by its lobbying juggernaut, the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), which in the first quarter of 2008 has already spent $1.5 million on lobbying efforts, more than it spent in all of 2007. Since 2002, the RIAA has contributed to the campaigns of 17 of the 24 members of the Judiciary Subcommittee on Courts, the Internet and Intellectual Property. These contributions total $115,070. Of those 17 subcommittee members, seven have come out publicly in favor of the bill (Reps. Robert Wexler (D-Fla.), Stephen Cohen (D-Tenn.), Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), Anthony Wiener (D-N.Y.), Berman, Issa and Conyers).

I’ll report back later.