Well, we’re going to admit, we didn’t see this one coming. In all of our reporting about the ludicrousness surrounding Fyre Festival 2, we figured we’d just keep hearing more and more about it failing to happen. Which absolutely happened, shocking no one.
What we didn’t expect within the madness, lack of artists, and dates shifting around, is ‘Fyre’ being licensed to become a music streaming service.
Yes, as absurd as it sounds, Fyre has reportedly entered into a deal with Shawn Rech to become a streaming service for musicians and fans alike. The festival itself is a separate matter that convicted felon Billy McFarland is still insisting will take place. Meanwhile, the Fyre name will be turned into a two-pronged music service that will launch on Thanksgiving of this year. One prong will be a supscription-video-on-demand service that will allow users to watch what they want, when they want. The other prong will be a FAST (Free Ad Supported Streaming Television) network.
Shawn Rech is not unfamiliar with streaming services he previously launched the true crime and documentary network, TruBlue with co-founder, Chris Hansen. What Rech seems to be doing here is latching onto the idea of Prometheus giving fire to mortals, and stating his new platform will put music back in the hands of people. “This isn’t about festivals or hype—it’s about putting the power of music discovery back in the hands of the fans.” Rech stated. And yes, he is aware of the less than stellar reputation that Fyre has and he welcomes it. As Rech also said, “I needed a big name that people would remember, even if it’s attached to infamy, so that’s why I bought these [trademarks] to start the streaming network.”
Musicians and aspiring artists will be able to submit their music and videos to Fyre, which is then viewable by subscribers. Those subs to the Fyre service will then be able to vote on what artists and videos get uploaded to FAST. Reportedly, the platform will start with pop and hip-hop, but hopes to expand out to other genres including spoken word and heavy metal. It’s also being said that McFarland will have some kind of presence on the network which is one way of really doubling down on that “any publicity is good publicity” concept.
The branding just seems like an absolutely horrible idea, but we guess we’ll have to see what happens. Heck, maybe their first performer will be Antonio Brown. We’ll continue to update you if this or the festival itself comes into being.
