How much is too much for Jay Z? Apparently, it’s never too much… his Made in America festival is coming to Los Angeles. He and Mayor Eric Garcetti announced this morning that the festival will take place in the new Grand Park downtown LA, during Labor Day weekend (August 30th-31st).
‘Two years ago, this was a dream, I had a vision of putting together a festival that blurred those lines of genres’, declared Jay Z on Wednesday morning… because other festivals don’t do that too? it’s almost his ‘I had a dream’ and this dream is all about making Jay Z richer. Could the east coast keep Jay Z please? We already have Coachella, the FYF fest and so many others for god’s sake, we don’t need Jay-Z’s fest! Made in America already exists in Philadelphia, fine, keep it this way, why extend it to the west coast? Because it brings tons of people and money – 60,000 people attended the Philadelphia festival last year and they expect at least 50,000 here.
But I wonder how they are going to control 50,000 people in this area, at New Year’s eve it was already very crowded and we weren’t even close to this number. As the Los Angeles Times noticed Grand Park is only 12 acres, not even half the size of Los Angeles State Historic Park, home of the FYF fest, and Hard festivals. Last year the FYF fest looked crowded and there were only 30,000 people attending!
Councilman Jose Huizar has expressed his concerns about the whole thing, declaring, ‘Since this is a for-profit, ticketed concert with an alcoholic beverage company as the main sponsor, we have questions over whether that is the best use for Grand Park, the so-called ‘people’s park.’ If it is, what is the public – that is the city and downtown Los Angeles community – getting in return?’
People’s park? It will soon be renamed Jay Z’s park, at this trend! Plus Huizar said that this would require street closures in the area for as many as 10 days, … I smell a protest coming! Actually they have already happened during Wednesday’s announcement, in the shape of a man holding a sign saying: ‘DTLA residents say no – Noise Pollution, tramped garden, corporate buyout, drinks and drugs [and] Jay Z.’ Wow, someone who is dissing Jay Z! We need more people like him.
But nobody is listening and Jay Z finds the place appealing, ‘I love that the festival will be in the middle of the city. Not too far away. No disrespect to any other festival’… ’It’s inclusion, it’s not exclusive’,… will he include the homeless too? Because there are a lot of them downtown… ‘Look at how beautiful Grand Park is,’ he said this morning,… Well, wait until 50,000 people trample on this grass for a few days and drink all that Budweiser, it’s gonna be a bit less pretty. But the mayor is on his side, ‘We’re going to celebrate our golden state of mind, L.A. is the world’s music capital … the music industry has helped build this city, and the creative sector is essential to our economy,’ said Garcetti, … of course these people see only the money this could generate and they are ready to kiss’s Jay Z’s ass as much as they can. As LAist reported ‘Today’s press conference wasn’t so much about answering any of those questions as much as pumping up the crowd and making plenty of references to Jay lyrics’,.. to what Supervisor Gloria Molina added ‘L.A. has 99 problems, but Jay Z and Budweiser Made in America ain’t one’. And you know what? The tickets are already on sale on Ticketmaster ($155) despite the fact that no lineup has been announced yet! What nerve! Only Coachella dares to do this.
Having been at Grand Park, I feel it is totally crazy to hold a festival of this size in this area, at the end more people are gonna hate Jay Z and this is good thing. LA needs neither another festival (especially the weekend following the FYF fest) nor Jay Z, Jay Z and his nine-animals-skin shoes should stay were they belong, on the east coast, on his private yacht counting his diamonds or his luxury cars.
