The founder of the catastrophic Fyre Fest is out of prison — and already planning a re-do.
Festival creator Billy McFarland was sentenced to six years in prison after the event, which resulted in hefty lawsuits. But now he's ready to orchestrate Fyre Fest II, which he swears will be the same high-end experience he'd originally promised, but with hotels instead of tents and full meals instead of cheese sandwiches.
Last time around, McFarland promised "luxury villas and gourmet food."
The Fyre Festival was billed as a luxury music festival in the Bahamas in 2017, but it turned into a disaster and fraud. Organized by Billy McFarland and Ja Rule, the event was poorly planned and executed, leaving attendees stranded with little food or shelter. McFarland was later sentenced to prison for wire fraud.
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“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,” McFarland, who now claims he's older and wiser, told NBC News.
The costs will begin at $1,400 to attend the three-day event and $1.1 million for the top VIP tickets which include an exclusive experience where people can spend time with him personally.
McFarland claims he already has 100 people signed up for tickets.
“It’s not about 10,000 people staring at a stage with their hands in the air,” he said. “It’s about getting on a plane with six people — two might be your friends, three might be people you met that morning — and going and exploring an island or a beach or a reef that you didn’t even know existed until you got in the airplane."
This time around, McFarland says that he's hired a festival production company to “handle the stages and the bathrooms and all the stuff that I clearly don’t know how to do.”
He won't reveal who that is, however.
McFarland is already involved in another lawsuit after a fellow inmate went into business with him. According to the lawsuit from Jonathan Taylor, McFarland breached their contract and ripped him off for more than $650,000. The two men formed PYRT Technologies, which was supposed to be a podcast involving a treasure hunt and other activities, the court documents say.
