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The Roots & Friends SXSW Jam

Source: Bud Light / Bud Light

One of the highlights of SXSW is an event and that didn’t even get to happen. This year would have been the third year that the Legendary Roots Crew was having their ‘Roots & Friends SXSW Jam.’   The line-up was going to be NICE with performances from The Roots, Ludacris, Dermot Kennedy, Jessie Reyez, Rapsody, Tank & the Bangas, Moon Taxi, & other surprise guests.  But the show got canceled.  Here is my first hand take of how I found out that The Roots & Friends SXSW Jam was canceled.

Late Saturday evening around 5:36 PM I was trying to get into the rap city party where Rae Sremmurd, along with some other artist were going to perform.  I wasn’t able to get into the venue because it was at full capacity. I then received a text message from one of the PR girls here in Houston telling me to come to where she is. I told her that I was only on 20% and I needed to charge my phone. My plan was to head back to the hotel room, let my phone charge for about 20 minutes, and then go check out Watch The Duck at another venue.  As I was about to call for an Uber ,to take me back to my room, my coworker Jasmine called me and told me to meet her and her friends at the SheaMoister lounge before we all headed to Fair Market for The Roots & Friends SXSW Jam.

I met up with Jasmine and her friends and we all rode to the venue in what seemed like a van version of a golf cart. When we got to the venue we saw that the line was incredibly long. As we were waiting for the doors to open, people who were working the venue begin walking up and down the line saying that people with wristbands were not going to get into the show. Then it changed to “only badge holders are now allowed in the show.” We all were confused as to why this was happening. We were thinking that maybe the venue was pass capacity and that is why they are cutting down on the number of people allowed into the venue. After an hour of waiting, a young lady in a black hoodie approaches Jasmine and I asked if we knew that the show was canceled because some guy was walking up the line saying that the show was canceled.  I told the young lady no and Jasmine began to get on Twitter to see if Bud Light made an announcement or if any of the unofficial SXSW groups that we were following had tweeted out anything.  Nothing.  So, we continued to wait in line. I then received a text from an old college buddy of mine asking where I was. I told him that I was at the venue for The Roots show and I was still standing in line. He told me that he was at the first of the venue and that he just heard the people running the place say that the show has been canceled.

Jasmine and I walk to the front of the venue to find my old college buddy. As we were closely approaching him, I stopped to ask one of the security workers of the venue what happened. He told me that there was a “security threat.” I then asked the man, “Are they giving any details on this threat?”  The gentleman then starts speaking in code and said, “If you’ve been paying attention to the things that’s been happening here over the last week…” I then said, “Oooohhh, it was a bomb threat.”

After I learned that bit of information my mood totally changed and I was ready to go, not only back to my hotel room, but back home to Houston.  My excitement was murdered by some loser who wanted to kill everyone’s fun and send out a bomb threat. During the Uber ride to my hotel room, I hopped on Twitter and saw, a now deleted tweet, from QuestLove of The Roots, that read,

“Uh, welp can’t say much but for those in Austin waiting in line to see us tonight, tonight’s show has been cancelled. They’ll make official announcement but I’d rather save y’all the trouble of waiting in line.”

Scrolling a bit more I then saw the statement from Bud Light which said,

“Due to a security concern, we have made the difficult decision to cancel tonight’s Bud Light x The RootsSXSW Jam. After working proactively with SXSW, the Austin Police Department, and other authorities, Bud Light believes this is the best course of action to ensure the safety of our guests, staff, and artists, and appreciate your understanding. We are truly sorry to have to cancel the event, but we felt it was necessary to take all safety precautions.”

I continue to scroll and then saw a photo of the set list and special guest who are going to come out for that performance. They were going to have Run DMC come out, SWV was gonna do a set, The Roots were going to do two sets, I was looking forward to seeing Tank and the Bangas, again, and drink all the free Bud Light I could! It was going to be a helluva jam session, but it never happened.

When I got back to my hotel room I fell asleep with the television on. Woke up around 6 AM and headed back to Houston Texas.  Hopefully next year I’ll get to experience The Roots & Friends SXSW Jam presented by Bud Light. 🤷🏿‍♂️