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The guys behind Rolling Loud
Meet Matt & Tariq the guys behind the biggest hiphop festival!
There's only one festival, one brand, one movement that can bring the Best Hip Hop artist
from all over the world to South Florida, and it's called Rolling Loud festival. From a small concert in 2015 to millions of tickets sold all around the world, Rolling loud should be the festival for your “summer bucket list”. Rolling Loud Miami is coming back to dolphin stadium with what will be by far the biggest three day hip hop festival in the world. Usually held in May, this year's Rolling Loud festival has been pushed to this summer
due to COVID restrictions, and trust me when I tell you that everyone in South Florida is excited to have a large music festival during the summer. We recently sat down with Matt and Tariq, founders of Rolling Loud festival, to discuss some of the new artists performing, red tapes that they needed to cut through to make this festival happen during Covid, and to discuss what rolling loud 2021 has in store for us.
MBLM: So it's been two years since the last Rolling Loud Miami, what have you guys been up to?
Matt: I've been doing some yoga and shit, you know, trying to get my mind right, now I'm ready to rock.
Tariq: Matt and I have had a long offseason, but we stayed busy, we did a partnership with Twitch we produced 4 virtual festivals , we expanded our media team, we expanded our merch division, all types of cool stuff, so that we are ready when we get back to now, selling out each festival, and making each festival better.
MBLM: I see you have 50cent for New York Rolling Loud, how was that conversation:
Matt: We didn't actually speak to him but I grew up listening to him, I think 50 cent is going to be a legendary performance, I think our fans will enjoy him, especially the people that don't know him well, it's a great look for him and for the festival. He's a very powerful player in New York, and well respected in the Hip hop industry and we
are excited to have him.
MBLM: Did you guys have to jump thru a bunch
of hoops and red tape to get the festival approved
for this year?
Tariq: You know there's this thing that happened
all thru 2020, that made it kind of difficult to
produce concerts, but we are happy it's all coming
to an end. I'm really excited to getting back to
producing the shows. There's always hoops we
go thru behind the scene, regardless of what's
happening in the world, yes there's hoops but
we Jump!
MBLM: Are there any Covid guidelines that
people should know about before heading to
the concert?
Tariq: We encourage people to take safety into
it's own hands, follow the local laws, we
encourage people to get vaccinated and wear
masks, but they are not required.
Matt: Whatever the state guidelines are
required, we are going to follow for everyone
to have a safe show.
"There's always hoops
we go thru behind the scene, regardless of what's happening in the world"
Tariq
MBLM: Any new activities or activations happening this year?
Matt: We've been really beefing up experientials,
the site is going to be Disney world for hip hop fans. We are none stop thinking of new experiences for the site.
MBLM: Matt what new artist are you excited to see
this year?
Matt: I'm really excited to see Kodak, you know he's a big hero down here, Lil Durk had an amazing year, really excited to see city girls performing together, Megan Thee Stallion super excited for her, MoneyBagg Yo, the list goes on. I haven't seen a lot of them perform before so I'm super excited to be at a show.
Tariq: I have to say Hot Boii, Ski Mask, lil baby,
travis scott, spotem gottem, trippie redd, I love
lil uzi he puts on a good show, bobby shmurda
super excited for that, that's going to be crazy.
"Rolling Loud is a lifestyle brand, we
are not just a concert or festival, we
eat, breathe, bleed Rolling Loud"
Matt
MBLM: I have a 17 & 20 year old and they always ask me “How did they come up with the name Rolling Loud”. Are you guys Rolling Stones fan? We're you rolling in your ride with the music loud?
Tarig: To my recollection, we don't really have any recollection. Really neither of us knows,
Matt: When we started touring with D.O.P Entertainment back in the days, we would always grab domain names of cool names, I remember one day our Godaddy account had over 100 domain purchases. Anything cool we would always get the website. And if we ever decided to use it for something we would have it available. At that time that was a big business for people, buying domain names and then selling them. I'm sure there was some cannabis involved. So I'm assuming we were probably high, and we thought it was a good idea. Rolling Loud is a lifestyle brand, we are not just a concert or festival, we eat, breathe, bleed rolling loud. From my head to my toes, to music, everything is rolling loud.
Tarig: What Matt is saying is that we had the name before we had the festival. We embrace counter cultures, like double on Tantra names like D.O.P Entertainment stands for delivering outstanding professional entertainment. So Rolling Loud can be a triple on tantra that can mean a lot of things, it could be rolling in the car loud down the street, it can be how you carry yourself, like the way your roll loud on how you dress.
MBLM: I saw a video from rolling loud 2018 where puff daddy stated that Rolling Loud is the
Woodstock of hiphop. How did that feel? And how are you guys dealing with the growth of the festival?
Matt: We've been fortunate enough to have an amazing team that we've been able to build, which has given us the ability to expand and be efficient, and hearing that from Diddy is amazing. We are extremely appreciative that he would consider this festival so meaningful to the culture. For us is like a dream come true, it's something that we always wanted to do, throw parties and have fun. And we've been very fortunate to be able to do this not only in the USA but to the world. And for us it's our way of giving back.
Tariq: Matt and I and our team we share the same physiology that each event should be better than the last event. We always decide to build from the last show, whether is making the line up bigger,
whether it's making the stages better, or more art activations, better customer service, whatever it is we are a young company and we try to do better every time. And we still don't think we are as good as we can be.
MBLM: Since the festival usually ends late, you guys ever thought of having a “camp out” section of the
festival? Where people would pay an extra fee and they can camp there?
Tariq: We don't usually end late, all depends on if the artists show up late, camping is a thing that we
believe our crowd wouldn't be into, or actually feasible at hard rock stadium. But I say never say never, maybe one of our festivals one day in another country might work.
MBLM: In the past 5 years who has been your favorite performers, top 3.
Tariq: XXXtentacion, Travis Scott, lil uzi vert
Matt: XXXtentacion, Kid cudi, post Malone.
MBLM: With all the shootings going on all over the world, are you guys getting stricter with the security?
Matt: Gun violence is a serious issue in America, we run our festival like its fort knocks , you can't get a
weapon into Rolling Loud, we pride ourselves on that.
Tariq: Rolling Loud takes security very serious, we work with professionals, we work with local police
to make sure we do everything we can to keep everyone safe. Our top priorities is keeping our fans safe and we are going to do everything in our power to make that happen, because without the fans there's no rolling loud.
"Our Top priorities is keeping our fans safe and we are going to do
everything in our power to make that happen, because without the fans
there's is no Rolling Loud""
Tariq
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