Just one week after it was announced, the Great American State Fair concert series has pretty much imploded. Six of the nine artists originally set to perform on the National Mall have dropped out, all of them effectively claiming they were pitched a nonpartisan show celebrating America’s 250th anniversary, only to realize the event would be way more political, with glaring ties to President Donald Trump (who’s since announced himself as the real headliner, anyway — go figure).
Those to go include Martina McBride, Bret Michaels, Morris Day and the Time, Young MC, the Commodores, and Milli Vanilli. Those who remain: Vanilla Ice, C+C Music Factory (though it’s complicated), and Flo Rida. And of those three, Flo Rida has been conspicuously quiet about the whole debacle.
While the musicians who’ve dropped out have all shared statements, and those who’ve stayed have defended their positions — none more emphatically than C+C’s Freedom Williams, who unleashed an outrageous rant from his toilet — Flo Rida has said zilch. Or at least close to zilch.
The past few days, his social pages have been filled with angry comments, some of which he’s responded to with laughing emojis. And on Monday, he posted the kind of statement one could read as the defiance of a man hearing the criticism and choosing to ignore it, without actually directly addressing it either.
“Regardless of all the noise in the world we can still choose every day to be positive and share the good news,” he wrote, adding, “”So are you really living or are you letting the world wear you down. As you can see, Me and my #family are rejoicing in the blessings #grateful for these moments.”
Compare this vague posting with Freedom Williams, who declared “I don’t fuck with Trump,” while simultaneously signaling his intent to play the show when he rebuffed angry fans with this all-timer quote: “I will vote for fucking Genghis Khan, Hitler, and motherfucking Ivan the Terrible before I let you n—s tell me what to motherfucking do.”
(It should be noted that while Williams was C+C’s lead rapper, his current use of the group’s name is controversial. The band’s actual co-founder, Robert Clivillés, has heavily criticized Williams and emphatically distanced himself from the MC and the Freedom 250 concert.)
Additionally, Rolling Stone has reached out to Flo Rida’s management multiple times for comment, with no response. His booking agent, Jeff Epstein (yeah, we know), didn’t respond to a request for comment either. (Epstein represents several other artists tied to Freedom 250.)
This resounding silence from Flo Rida and his team was enough to make us wonder: Does Flo Rida even know that he’s scheduled to perform a concert in Washington, D.C. on July 2? Is Flo Rida actually playing a concert in Washington, D.C. on July 2?
Faced with this question — which is really serious, and not just facetious fodder for a story — we set out for answers, and quickly found them on, of all places, Flo Rida’s website.
First of all, the tour itinerary on Flo Rida’s site lists no July 2 concert, neither in Washington, D.C., nor anywhere else. That said, the live section is pretty skimpy. The European tour he just wrapped is still up there, but it doesn’t include other shows he’s scheduled to play this summer in North America (which do appear real, as you can buy tickets to them on Ticketmaster if you really want).
Second, it turns out Flo Rida’s website has its own personalized AI chatbot, FloGPT. While FloGPT suggests prompts like “Flo, how do you come up with hooks that are so catchy?”, or “Flo, what’s one health or fitness tip you live by?”, we ignored that softball shlock and went straight for the one, hard-hitting question we had: “Is Flo Rida performing at the Great American State Fair concert series organized by Freedom 250?”
The response shocked us: “The Great American State Fair concert series, organized by Freedom 250, is known for featuring a diverse lineup of artists. However, there is no confirmed information about Flo Rida performing at this event.” (Emphasis added.)
Well, there you have it. Kind of. Is that a real concrete answer? Absolutely not. Do we know more than we did at the beginning of this post? Don’t think so. Still, we’ll keep trying to get in touch with actual people, because while we’d really like to trust FloGPT for the bit, we’re not so silly as to lend any AI that kind of credence.
Screengrab by author
