Ice Spice was booked as one of the headliners of Australia’s Wildlands Festival on New Year’s Eve. It did not go well.
The “Princess Diana” rapper reportedly showed up 25 minutes late for her 30-minute set, and left after only two songs. Videos from the festival show the moment Ice Spice’s mic was cut, eliciting boos from the restless crowd.
“At 11.01 p.m. – they gave her an extra minute – they cut the mic and you heard the collective sigh from the crowd,” podcaster Brenton Larney told the Guardian. “They’d been waiting for a while and they get two songs? So that was a bit ridiculous and it was just really disrespectful how she walked off, she was laughing they tried to give her flowers for her birthday and she just shrugged them off.” He added that it appeared Ice Spice seemed like she “didn’t want to be there… It was just really disrespectful to see.”
Wildlands acknowledged the incident on social media. “We understand that Ice Spice’s delayed arrival caused some frustration,” the festival wrote. “Managing a stacked festival means that we have to be extremely firm with scheduled set times. We had a strict curfew of 12:30 and needed to ensure that Chase & Status went on stage on time so you could all enjoy the NYE Countdown!”
Ice Spice released a deluxe version of her debut album Y2K! on Christmas.
