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First appeared on April 28, 2003
The ghosts of Method Man and Redman haunted Bumstock field Saturday night, as drenched spectators waited in front of an empty stage for a rap act that never arrived.
Scheduled to begin his set at 11:15 p.m., headliner Fat Joe was still missing at 11:30 p.m., when Bumstock Director Cortlynn Hepler made the announcement that the rapper would not peform.
On Saturday night, Hepler attributed the cancellation to “circumstances beyond our control,” although in an interview with The Maine Campus yesterday, Hepler and Erin Smith, music director for Bumstock, said more specifically that the rapper failed to arrive in the Bangor area at any point Saturday evening.
“I would say it became a large potential for him not to show late in the night,” Hepler said. “Once that happened, we basically started announcing it and stopped charging.”
Bumstock student personnel said they played a strung-out game of phone tag with the rapper over the course of the day, where Hepler and Smith continually tried to reach the performer’s management and were told repeatedly that the tour bus was nearing Bangor. Hepler said he was finally forced to make an announcement when it became clear that the rapper was not going to arrive on campus.
“We didn’t have any idea of his whereabouts,” Smith said. “We were told he crossed into Maine, we were told he was in Massachusetts, but we can’t be sure of that.”
According to Hepler, bands were required to report to Bumstock personnel 45 minutes before their set was scheduled to begin. Smith said a manager for Fat Joe told her the bus had left New York City at aproximatley 12:15 p.m.
“They were telling us they were going to get there at 7:30 p.m., 8:30 p.m. in the evening,” Smith said. She said that would have left the rapper ample time to move from his Bangor hotel room to campus for the advertised 11 p.m. concert. Hepler said the rapper’s management made periodic calls to the staff at various points in the day, updating them on the tour bus’s location. However, Smith said a lapse in the late afternoon where the Bumstock staff received no phone calls made them suspicious.
“Basically, when it got late in the evening,” Hepler said, “they started calling us, and telling us ‘we’re here,’ and then they would be like, ‘OK, we’re just about to cross the Maine border.’ We talked to them again about two hours later, and they’d be like ‘we’re on 495, exit 49.’”
According to Hepler and Smith, Fat Joe’s contract entitled him to $25,000 after the performance, but he will not collect any of the money.
“The University of Maine Student Government doesn’t do guarantees,” Hepler said. “All bands got paid after the show. He gets zero.”
Hepler was cautious when asked about potential legal action against the rapper, but he said he will consult with campus lawyers Ted Curtis and David Miller on Monday.
“[We will] be pursuing recourse for damage of reputation of the university, reputation of Student Government and expenses that were incurred upon us,” Hepler said. “All those things are legality issues that could lead to a lawsuit.”
Asked if they ever suspected Fat Joe might not show up for the weekend concert, both Hepler and Smith issued firm denials.
“No,” Hepler said. “We checked references, checked other shows, we looked into it. When we knew we were going to select a hip-hop act, we tried to select one that, according to our agents, was a strong possibility to show up.”
