Not even Joanne the Scammer could have orchestrated night one of Fyre Festival, the luxury Bahamas music fest co-organized by Ja Rule, with artists including Pusha T, Lil Yachty, Migos, Disclosure, Major Lazer, and Kaytranada scheduled to perform over the festival’s two weekends. The festival’s opening night quickly derailed Thursday evening, when attendees arrived to an unfinished campsite at the festival’s location in the Bahamas on the island of Exumas, according to Pitchfork. Later on, festival headliners Blink-182 pulled out, tweeting they were “not confident that we would have what we need to give you the quality of performances we always give fans.†Instead of the luxe island villas promised to festivalgoers — ticket prices ranged from $1,000 to $12,000 and VIP packages up to $250,000 — people on the scene described the setup as a “disaster tent city.â€
For reference, here is what Fyre Festival was supposed to look like:
Getting flights to and from the pricey event has also proved to be a problem, according to the BBC. Flights to the island were canceled — an airline rep told passengers the Fyre Festival island was overcapacity, according to Billboard — and passengers reported long delays getting back to the United States. Via Instagram, the festival alerted guests that staff was working to accommodate them as the festival workers deal with “the growing pains that every first year event experiences.†Fyre later tweeted updates declaring the festival “fully postponed.â€
In a now-deleted tweet saved by BuzzFeed, the Bahamas Ministry of Tourism issued a statement saying festival staff “did not have the capacity to execute an event of this scale.†Vulture has reached out to Ja Rule and the event’s organizers and will update when we hear back.
Update 2:38 p.m. For all those wondering where Ja is, he’s finally released a short statement on Twitter. For the record, he says, Fyre Fest was “NOT A SCAM†and it is “NOT [HIS] FAULT,†but he’s working to get everyone off the island and out of this real-life Hunger Games shortly.