Despite negative publicity and a criminal conviction after organizing the ill-fated 2017 Fyre Festival, Billy McFarland told NBC's "Today" that he is organizing a comeback Fyre Festival.
He has not said where the event will be located, nor if any artists have signed on, but he did confirm the event would be held in late April. He also confirmed that the infamous cheese sandwiches that were served at the 2017 edition will once again be served.
“We will have cheese sandwiches,” he told "Today." “They’re going to be super expensive, too. We’re going to make them, like, really good. That’ll be, like, the highest priced food item, I think.”
He also said ticket prices would range from $1,400 to $1.1 million. And what would a $1.1 million ticket entail?
“You will be on a boat, have the luxury yachts that we partner with who will be docked and parked outside the island,” he told "Today." “But once again, Fyre is not just about this, like, luxury experience. It’s about the adventure. So you’ll be scuba diving with me. You’ll be bouncing around to other islands and other countries on small planes.”
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Fyre Festival was a highly anticipated music festival that was set to take place on a private island in the Bahamas in 2017.
The event was promoted by a slew of celebrities and social media influencers like Kendall Jenner, Bella Hadid, Hailey Bieber, and Emily Ratajkowski as a luxury event featuring exquisite food, extravagant accommodations, and top-tier performances from groups like Blink-182, Migos, and Rae Sremmurd.
McFarland and his team, which included rapper Ja Rule, had promised a high-end, exclusive experience, but the reality was a far cry from what was advertised.
The festival was plagued with numerous problems from the very beginning, starting with the location itself. The private island in the Bahamas lacked infrastructure and wasn't properly equipped with basic necessities such as water and electricity. When festivalgoers arrived, they quickly found themselves in a chaotic and hazardous situation.
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The fiasco prompted an eye-opening Netflix documentary titled "Fyre: The Greatest Party That Never Happened." It provided an in-depth look at the events leading up to the festival, including how McFarland and his team were able to use social media to manipulate and scam people out of millions of dollars.
In the aftermath, McFarland faced numerous lawsuits and was later arrested and charged with multiple counts of wire fraud. He pleaded guilty in 2018 and was sentenced to six years in prison.
McFarland, though, believes he can use the notoriety of the failed 2017 event to sell people on its 2025 comeback.
“Since 2016, Fyre has been the most talked about music festival in the world,” he said. “Obviously, a lot of that has been negative, but I think that most people, once they kind of get under the hood and study the plans and see the team behind Fyre II, they see the upside. We have the chance to embrace this storm and really steer our ship into all the chaos that has happened. And if it’s done well, I think Fyre has a chance to be this annual festival that really takes over the festival industry.”
