Long before the rapper Rick Ross allegedly started “selling dope straight off the iPhone,” the drug dealer Ricky Donnell Ross, a man the Wall Street Journal called “a mastermind of the crack-cocaine trade,” was pushing 100 kilos of Nicaraguan blow per day and building a $600 million criminal empire under…
As usual, the City of Miami commission meeting convened at 9 a.m. today. Amid discussion of telecommunication contracts and waste management, our municipal pols will also decide whether vice chairman Marc Sarnoff was correct when he called Ultra Music Festival fans a “urinating, defecating … throwing up” mob of “kids…
We here at Crossfade have been trying to get Miami commissioner Marc Sarnoff’s side of the Ultra Music Festival story for approximately 48 hours. Today, we finally got a chance to talk to his spokesperson about the commissioner’s attempt to curb Ultra’s second weekend. “We are not talking about shutting…
Contrary to Marc Sarnoff’s alarmist claims, EDM fans aren’t all “kids on some sort of mind-altering drug” with a fetish for “urinating, defecating, or throwing up” on the streets of Downtown Miami. Just take Irvine Welsh, the 54-year-old Scottish author of Trainspotting and 11 other books. He’s been a strident…
Marc Sarnoff still hasn’t returned repeated calls to Crossfade about his anti-Ultra Music Festival stance. But considering Tommie Sunshine’s push to get EDM fans to call and email him, we’re pretty sure he’s been busy the last for the last few 24 hours. However, we do finally have a response…
Despite Ultra Music Festival’s annual $79 million contribution to the local economy, City of Miami commissioner Marc Sarnoff believes the “event will be disruptive to the local business community and area residents due to noise, nuisance behavior of festival goers, and grid lock traffic.” After all, as he fear-mongered during…
Yesterday, Crossfade broke the news that Commissioner Marc Sarnoff had introduced a resolution “disapproving” of the second weekend of Ultra Music Festival.We still don’t entirely understand whether the commission could actually force the festival to cancel its second weekend, and repeated messages Crossfade left with the city attorney and Sarnoff…
It can’t be Ultra Music Festival without a little bit of drama. This time it comes from Miami Commissioner Marc Sarnoff who has introduced a new resolution “disapproving” of the second weekend of Ultra Music Festival.The resolution, which the commission will consider on Thursday, claims the “event will be disruptive…
Is Rick Ross a gangsta? Well, he’ll be playing one on cable television. An omnivorous student of gangland myths, the larger-than-life rapper is finally taking his flair for the dramatic to the small screen, joining the cast of Starz’s Magic City, a late-1950s crime drama set in Rozay’s real-life hometown,…
Three reasons Ultra Music Festival 2013’s gonna be epic, beat freaks. 1. The EDM megafest has expanded from three days to two whole uhntz-uhntz-ing weekends. 2. Swedish House Mafia and Deadmau5 are gonna be the primary party starters. 3. The just-announced Phase 1 linuep, including 13 extra DJs, 13 additional…
Has the apocalypse been averted? Or are the end days still upon us? The Mayans’ calculations may have been a lil’ off. But Miami hip-hop crew ¡Mayday! remains convinced that the Armageddon is imminent. Specifically, a rotting plague of walking corpses hungry for human flesh. And the ¡Mayday! plan for…
Story Nightclub has only been open for, like, a week and a half, and it’s already made the front page of TMZ for a hilarious celebrity nip slip. Our homies Cultist reported that Modern Family’s Sofia Vergara came down to the new SoBe club to party with Kaskade, but ended…
Kat Stacks says: “Freedom baby.” That’s right … The supergroupie and former Tootsie’s Cabaret stripper (who scored 2010/11’s Best 15 Minutes of Fame by claiming to have humped the entire Young Money crew, Soulja Boy, Bow Wow, and basically every other rapper who ever rolled through Dade, Broward, or Palm…
It’s been 18 days since DJ Shadow got kicked off the decks at Mansion Miami for playing “too future for all of y’all.” And it’s been a week and a half since the South Beach nightclub offered its “sincere apologies to DJ Shadow and his fans for his set being…
Society’s inexplicable obsession with Justin Bieber cost a man his life in Los Angeles. And the Biebz says a lack of “meaningful legislation” is to blame. According to CNN, a paparazzo, whose name has not been released, was struck by oncoming traffic as he attempted to walk across Interstate 405…
Fiscal Cliff? Boring. But celebrity baby announcements? Now that’s what we call news. Kanye West and Kim Kardashian are having a baby! Last night, the 35-year-old rapper channeled his inner Ricky Ricardo, dedicating part of his Atlantic City concert to his “Perfect Bitch” and her childbearing hips. “Stop the music…
This Chrismahanukwanzika, Drake did something really, really crazy. He walked into a Walgreens. And it must have been the first time since late November 2011. Because the “greatest ever” rapper just realized the commercial giants of the world have been stacking cake all year by marketing his hashtag swag word…
Pop gossip. Most of us want to believe that we’re too intelligent and cultured to be fascinated with such gutter-trash information, but the reality is we all love to sniff the dirty underwear of the stars. Whether it’s a child star blossoming into a full-fledged sex symbol, a battered woman…
We here at Crossfade imagine this was the conversation, which must have taken place on Deadmau5’s couch while cuddling adorable kitty cats. “Baaaaby, I want to go to Ultra this year,” said Katt Von D, all tatted and pretty and in some tank top. “But shnookums, Ultra Music Festival and…
“I’ve waited a long time to play here. But they said this shit’s too future for all of y’all.” That’s how DJ Shadow said goodnight to clubbers at Mansion on South Beach after getting kicked off the decks last Saturday. For the second time in 2012, the Opium Group-owned nightclub…
Ever done the Swamp Stomp? And nah, dude, it ain’t a muddy-ass dance. We’re talkin’ about the totally homegrown 2,000 person-strong music festival that “started as a killer backyard barbecue with a bunch of bands and booze and a few friends in 2007.” It’s always the most “badass, rockenest, craziest,…
These days, Fat Joe ain’t so fat. But he owes an obese (or is that obscene?) amount of back taxes to the IRS. According to a press release from the Department of Justice: “Joseph Cartagena, the rapper popularly known as ‘Fat Joe,’ pleaded guilty [in New Jersey] today to two…
