Despite being a New Yorker to the core, Joey Bada$$ is heading west for a less muggy climate. Specifically, he’s moving his Steez Day Festival, which debuted at Central Park’s Summer Stage in 2015, to the west coast. The inaugural Steez Day Festival featured Pro Era, Flatbush Zombies, The Underachievers, Smoke DZA, A$AP Ferg and more, all gathering for the purpose of raising money for Steez’s family.
The 2016 iteration of the Steez Day Festival will take place in Los Angeles on July 7. The acts have yet to be announced, but Joey Badmon is undoubtedly working hard to top last year’s already impressive lineup.
XXL spoke with the Brooklyn emcee about the change of venues. “There’s so many people that are inspired by me and the movement that we want the experience to be shared with them,” Joey explained. “We did it last year in New York and I got hit by everybody, literally everywhere in the world, like ‘Yo, can you do Steez Day here?’ And for us, California is our second biggest market so it really just made the most sense.” Spoken like the master businessman he wants to emulate.
Turns out though, it wasn’t all due to spreading the love. Joey would never leave his hometown hanging, clarifying in a now-deleted tweet that the Steez Day Festival would only be on the west coast for this year “due to radius clauses.”
Tickets go on sale this Friday, May 13, at 10am.