Fyre Festival’s Billy McFarland: Does He Deserve a Second Chance? | Miss Understood #367

Summary

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Miss Understood with Rachel Uchitel

Episode #367 — Fyre Festival’s Billy McFarland: Does He Deserve a Second Chance?

Release Date: April 7, 2026

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Episode Overview

Rachel Uchitel sits down with Billy McFarland, the notorious founder behind the disastrous Fyre Festival, for an in-depth and candid conversation. This episode seeks to move beyond the headlines, exploring the motivations that led Billy to entrepreneurial highs, infamous lows, and his current quest for redemption. The two discuss his childhood, rise as a young tech founder, the creation and implosion of Fyre Festival, prison life, and his controversial return with “Phoenix,” a new festival venture. Rachel presses on whether he’s learned from past mistakes—and whether society should offer him a real second chance.

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Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. Early Entrepreneurial Drive

(02:24–07:37)

• Normal Beginnings, Digital Fascination:

  • Billy grew up in suburban New Jersey, “a very regular family,” and credits receiving a computer in 5th grade as a “beginning of the end, or the beginning of the beginning” (03:14).
  • Self-taught in programming, he started businesses as a pre-teen—by age 13, he ran a web hosting business with three employees.

• First Ventures and Taste of Success:

  • Built and sold small social networks throughout adolescence, including one to Buddy TV in high school (“Went to college like literally with a suitcase of cash.” – 05:38).

• Pattern of Jumping Projects:

  • Billy reflects on his tendency to move quickly from one idea to the next:

    “The projects would lead me to a new door that I didn't know existed. I would open the door and then I'd see an even bigger door…but I didn't complete the mission.” (14:41)

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2. Magnesis: The “Millennial Black Card”

(08:01–10:57)

• The Concept:

  • “I started a black card for young people…to give access or create these experiences around this life that I was starting to live.” (08:01)
  • Targeted at young urban professionals, Magnesis grew to about 30,000 members.
  • “Tons of people got married through it…it’s funny to see now people with like, you know, husbands, wives, kids, houses, all kind the early Magnesis days.” (09:53)

• Undone by Distraction:

  • Billy regrets not seeing the company through:

    “One of my biggest regrets was not seeing Magnesis through…Once I had something that really worked, not seeing it through the finish line.” (10:28)

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3. Fyre: From Booking Platform to Catastrophic Festival

(11:10–22:29)

• Tech Origins Misunderstood:

  • Fyre wasn’t meant to start as a festival but as a tech platform to connect event organizers with artists, created out of frustration with opaque booking processes.

    “The festival itself was like an impulsive marketing idea…and it’s ironic that’s what it’s known for now.” (11:46–12:10)

• The Ja Rule Partnership:

  • Ja Rule had been booked multiple times and became a business partner. Their momentum attracted attention and resources:

    “I think momentum is really contagious, right?...We kind of created this snowball effect.” (18:01)

• The Shift to Festival:

  • The Fyre Festival concept emerged during a Bahamas trip as a way to dazzle artists and investors, then quickly spiraled:

    “It was just operating under the regular Fyre company. Momentum dragged in talent, investors, brands—it got really big really quickly.” (18:01)

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4. Countdown to Disaster: What went wrong at Fyre?

(27:30–37:51)

• In Over His Head:

  • Set an unrealistic four-month deadline:

    “Didn’t have any appreciation or understanding of the logistics needed to literally build a city out of nowhere… So dead set on this date I made unethical, bad…decisions to try to satisfy this date.” (27:30)

• Pivotal Mistakes:

  • Advertised the event as on “Pablo Escobar’s island,” violating the rental agreement and getting kicked off (29:09).
  • A cascade of cascading failures: infrastructure, weather, tent quality, water supply.

• “Crash” Moment:

  • Rachel asks if anything could have saved it; Billy responds with a “crash stacking” metaphor:

    “One issue never crashes the plane...when like 6, 7, 8, 9 issues stack up, that’s what crashes the plane.” (29:52)

• Notable Quote:

  “I didn't know we were in trouble until I was standing on this milk carton...I realized all the mistakes…became so big…where the truth no longer mattered.” (34:41)

• Famous “Water Incident” Debunked:

  • On the now-infamous request for his event producer Andy King to “suck d*ck” for water:

    “I learned about this story in jail…the story is not true.” (33:54–34:05)

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5. Legal Fallout and Prison

(38:00–49:48)

• Wire Fraud and Restitution:

  • Charged with wire fraud—had to pay back ~$26–27 million (“high twenties”).
  • “I was charged with wire fraud…every single month I have to give a check back to the government” (44:33).

• Only One Held Accountable:

  • Billy acknowledges he bore primary legal responsibility but claims,

    “The majority of the investors knew I was lying to them and invested despite that…Had I been honest, I think they would have given me more money and given it to me quicker. So what I thought was a shortcut was actually harming me...” (39:04)

• Prison Experience:

  • Served 4 of 6 years, cycled through multiple facilities.
  • Reveals punitive impact on family/friends:

    “The worst part…is that the punishment is hardest on your innocent friends and family.” (45:39)

  • Insight on fellow inmates:

    “There are very few really bad people…Most were desperate.” (46:16)

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6. The Aftermath: From Release to Phoenix Festival

(51:06–69:49)

• Getting Back on Feet:

  • Released to halfway house; a loyal friend offered a job and home base.
  • Rebuilding relationships took one-on-one effort:

    “It took that one-on-one touch point with every single person. I didn’t anticipate any of that having to happen.” (55:21)

• Why Return to Festivals:

  • “Number one goal is…I have this recurring dream where I can go and shake the hands of every single person that I believe I wronged…for them to recognize that I did what it took to pay it back.” (51:34)
  • Also admits being “scared of being completely powerless.”

• Fyre Festival 2 & The Phoenix Pivot:

  • Initial attempt to reboot Fyre Festival (“Fyre Festival 2”), sold out test tickets, negotiations with Mexico fell through after political/media blowback.
  • Pivoted to “Phoenix” Festival in Honduras:

    “We called it Phoenix. It was the Fyre vision.” (64:02)
    “400 people went to Phoenix…and Honduras delivered everything promised.” (64:12)

• Selling the Fyre Brand:

  • Sold the Fyre Festival name and did multiple licensing deals, including a planned Fyre musical and streaming service (65:12–65:28).

• Current Projects:

  • Marketing consulting, artist deals, documentary production, and involvement in Fyre Festival-related media:

    “Doing a lot of media marketing and artist related work…Helping artists with promotion, building platforms, helping startups…” (67:51)

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7. Personal Reflections & Lessons Learned

(56:35–73:54)

• Biggest Personal Changes:

  • Learned to value small circles, slow down, and not chase short-term validation:

    “Wanting to be around and be liked by a lot of people led to so many bad decisions…Now just valuing a few small relationships.” (56:48)

• No Relationship with Ja Rule:

  • “There’s no relationship.” (57:45)
  • On responsibility:

    “I was definitely driving the car, but all the passengers were bumping the music too.” (58:08)

• Redemption & Motivation:

  • Longs to make amends, even to those not legally considered victims:

    “Maybe not someone who the world even knows was wronged…” (72:49)

• On Public Perception and “Misunderstood” Label:

  • “I don’t know if I’m misunderstood… I’ve just made a lot of bad decisions in a short period of time and had a magnifying glass.” (72:22)
  • His one-sentence self-definition:

    “Takes care of people around him and never gives up…that’s the definition I want to live and die by.” (72:07)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Violating Trust:

  “My worst crime was actually violating the trust… That was the real moral and ethical violation.” (20:34)

• On the Legendary Water “Favor” Urban Legend:

  “I have no idea what this guy (guard) is talking about. What are they claiming I did now?” (33:23)

• On Mistakes Stacking Up:

  “One issue never crashes the plane…It was a combination of a lot of mishaps that led to the large failure.” (29:52)

• On Fyre 2’s Mexico Debacle:

  “Whether the scammer got scammed is like, kind of the ironic headline…” (61:45)

• On Motivation to Rebuild:

  “I want to show people that I paid it back in every possible way. And I felt like the only way to do it was to go and try to make a big positive impact.” (51:56)

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• 03:14 — Billy’s childhood & early programming ventures
• 08:01 — Origin of Magnesis card
• 11:46 — The real story of the Fyre concept
• 18:01 — Partnership with Ja Rule & festival snowball
• 27:30 — Realization of being in over his head
• 33:23 — The infamous water favor story debunked
• 34:41 — “Crash” moment at festival meltdown
• 44:33 — Restitution and legal consequences
• 45:39 — Prison’s hidden emotional costs
• 51:34 — Motivation for Fyre Festival 2/Phoenix
• 64:12 — Phoenix festival attendee count
• 66:25 — Licensing the Fyre name
• 72:07 — One-sentence response to fraud allegation

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Final Thoughts

Billy McFarland’s interview reveals complexity behind tabloid notoriety, illuminating the mix of hubris, hustle, blind spots, and resilience that led to his rise and collapse. He takes responsibility for the fraud, provides insight into the psychological traps of momentum and image, and makes a case—though not always convincingly—for redemption through action, not apology alone. For anyone curious about the human side behind the Fyre Festival saga, this episode offers a remarkably candid inside perspective.

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For feedback, guest recommendations, or questions, visit misunderstoodpodcast.com or find Rachel Uchitel on Patreon.

Transcript

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[Billy McFarland]

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[Rachel Yukatel]

Billy, thank you so much for joining me today on Misunderstood. It's really great to have you here. When I created this platform of people who had been reduced to a headline and they were on a mission to change their narrative before I even started, you were on my short list because I have followed your story for a long time. I found you fascinating and I wanted to hear your story from you because it's been that fascinating and everybody has a ton of questions. So anyways, thank you for joining us years after my original invite, but thank you.

[Billy McFarland]

Thank you, Rachel. Off probation now, so a little bit more free to talk and so excited to finally be here. And yeah, I got to deliver, I guess. Three years to practice.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Right, right, right. That's great. So listen, you're one of the most talked about founders of the last decade, maybe for some of the wrong reasons and I really want to give you a chance to like talk about that and walk us through what happened in your words. Right. But before that I was saying to you earlier I really think it's important to understand you. I've watched a lot of interviews with you, but I don't where you came from. I don't know how you got into this because whether or not people are like you, hate you, trust you, don't you are A very interesting entrepreneur. You get it, you are fast, you're a hustler. And that, that just doesn't come naturally. You learn that or you're kind of born into that. So what was your, where were you from? What was your childhood like? What did you want to be growing up?

[Billy McFarland]

I hope we get more exciting because I have the most boring answer. I grew up in the suburbs of New York City in New Jersey in a very regular family. I think the blessing and the curse of when I was growing up was that I got high speed Internet in my house in fifth grade and I received a computer that year for Christmas. And that was the beginning of the end, or the beginning of the beginning, however you want to frame it. I quickly fell in love with computers, taught myself how to program, and really used that early wild west days of the Internet as his vehicle to explore as a young preteen. And tried to find my own way in the world without a system and where rules really hadn't yet been established.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Right. Did you ever actually hold down a 9 to 5 job?

[Billy McFarland]

No, never had a 9 to 5 job. Had three full time employees when I was 13 and I got busted because one of them sent an invitation to his wedding to my parents house. And they're like, why the hell is this grown man inviting me to a wedding? Like, what's going on?

[Rachel Yukatel]

Oh my gosh. Wait, so what did you do at 13? What were you, what was your business?

[Billy McFarland]

Had a web hosting business and this is like pre Amazon aws and I helped small businesses get their websites online and they paid me like a monthly fee to operate their websites.

[Rachel Yukatel]

How much were you making?

[Billy McFarland]

Not that much, but it was great for like a 13 year old and enough to pay three people, but you know, can't afford my Manhattan rent, so.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Wow, amazing. Okay, so did you go to college?

[Billy McFarland]

I went to college. I went to a small school in Pennsylvania called Bucknell. I was supposed to study computer science. I ended up starting my first like venture backed tech startup during my freshman year. Raised money for that and dropped out of school and never went back.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Wow. All right, so can you tell us a little bit of like what you did once you dropped out of school? What were your big ideas? What did you want to do? What were you good at?

[Billy McFarland]

So the story went back to my later years in middle school and high school. I started a social networking site for my middle school. This is like in the early Facebook days, this private network for all my middle school kids. And I love this feeling where I'd wake up and go to school in the morning. And a good percentage of my like friends, they were all using my website every single night. So it helped me like break the ice with girls, it helped me get more friends. And it was kind of like this weird experience where I'd go home, do something like super nerdy and then actually impacted my day to day life. I sold that. I sold a couple more, like small ones throughout middle school and high school.

[Rachel Yukatel]

When you say sell, like, were you making actually a lot of money and selling it to like a big company or you were just kind of handing it off for couple.

[Billy McFarland]

The first one started small for, you know, a couple thousand bucks. And then in high school I started a real one that I sold to a company called Buddy TV out of Seattle. And that was pretty sizable for like a 15 or 16 year old. I went to college like literally with a suitcase of cash. I never really had, you know, much experience like money or resources as a kid. Live with my family, like really normal, like suburban lifestyle. Went to College as an 18 year old, you know, bought a car, went to nightclubs or like traveling around the world and realizing like what I could do with a couple bucks in my pocket.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Yeah.

[Billy McFarland]

Blew it all in the first semester and was like, fuck, I need that back. And like, how can I get that feeling back? And that was to get back to programming. So I started what I thought would be another social network during my first year of college and raised money to go out and attempt to build another social network.

[Rachel Yukatel]

So how old are you now?

[Billy McFarland]

I'm 34 now.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Oh, you're 34. Okay. So I'm 51. And when I grew up, I don't know if you know these people. Do you know Noah Tupperberg and Jason Strauss?

[Billy McFarland]

Yes.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Okay, so they were in my. I went to Nightingale, they went to St. David's I guess, and then ended up going to Riverdale and blah, blah, blah. And they were like ahead of the time back then too because at 15 and 16 they were helping doing, promoting at these nightclubs and making. I dated. Jason and I were each other's first kiss when we were 13. And I remember being in his bedroom and he had this metal box and it was filled with cash and there's cash like coming out of the sides of the metal box. And then he had to get another one. And it was fascinating. But you know, fast forward. Noah and Jason created a monster and now they teach at Harvard about creating a brand and they, for people that are listening, they ended up starting marquee and then we went to Vegas and we did Tao and they have like over 40 brands now. And it started as a kid, so it's like not unheard of that people really can figure out what they want to do as a kid and understand that customer service becomes a huge part of the best part of a business and keeps you in business because those relationships end up being the thing that gets you further than sometimes college.

[Billy McFarland]

Yeah, totally agree. I think the like a tendencies to explore or like resourcefulness, I think that often appears when you're younger and how you channel that, both good or bad, obviously is told as you grow up.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Right. So the first thing that I think got you a lot of press was, or at least from what I've seen is you created this like black card or this card for people to be social with. Right, Correct.

[Billy McFarland]

So I started a black card for young people initially in New York City called Magnesis. The background was I moved to New York, I was 18, I had a venture backed business. I raised venture capital for my social network company in college. And I started to meet people from all these different industries that I just didn't really know existed. Coming from the New Jersey suburbs, I'd be in meetings like record labels or TV networks or music artists and there's this whole big world out there. I kept calling my friends who are now sophomores in college, trying to explain to them what was happening in New York, and no one really believed me. So I started with this black card as a way to give access or create these experiences around this life that I was starting to live or really starting to explore and see what was out there in the world.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Right. And I saw that it became something you started to get press for. You were on some TV networks or news stations about it. So it really took off and people found this to be like something that was worthy of money and of access. Right.

[Billy McFarland]

I think it was. These are like the pre member club days. There was so house and that was kind of like the only membership option. It was certainly at that time at least a higher level of clientele than I was targeting. I was 19 years old, so I was targeting the younger 20s people who were in their first or second years and maybe a good job but weren't quite there yet on the income scale or like really established yet in life. So it was kind of this really interesting like millennial membership club. We had almost 30,000 members paying us an annual fee. So it was like a really good business and it was a fun business because every time I would meet somebody New or go and explore a new location through my more tech esque company. I would then try to open that up and offer it to my peers. And so it's like a really kind of fun way to explore my early like late teens and early 20s.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Right. And it was way of like buying cool almost because these people who might not have had access to that stuff were, were all of a sudden getting invites to special parties or feeling like they were part of the in crowd.

[Billy McFarland]

Exactly. My, my target clientele was like the more corporate college graduate who's, you know, their second year into their job. They just moved to New York City from wherever they grew up. And this kind of gave them the ability to explore at an enhanced rate, maybe meet some interesting people. Tons of people got married through it. So funny to see now people with like, you know, husbands, wives, kids, houses, all kind the early Magnesis days. That's pretty cool.

[Rachel Yukatel]

So, and I think the thought then is that you were way ahead of your time. You were a genius. You were this entrepreneur that was young that you were opening doors for yourself and others. So how did that end up? Did you sell it? What happened with that?

[Billy McFarland]

One of my biggest regrets was not seeing Magnesis through. We had a couple of acquisition offers from companies that you've heard of. We didn't accept them for various reasons. It was really good business and I got distracted by the allure and the glitz and I think what the real potential was of Fire. And after Fire failed, which I'm sure we'll get into, I sold Magnesis for pennies. So one of the biggest like commercial and personal regrets was once I had something that really worked, not seeing it through the finish line.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Got it.

[Billy McFarland]

And just trying to sprint and move so quickly, not understanding what I had was great and I didn't need to skip to the next at that point in my life.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Right. So, you know, I was watching the documentary the other day. How did you come up with the name Fire?

[Billy McFarland]

It was a totally made up word. Magnesis was a made up word as well. I think we kind of like reversed engineered it later to say that Fire stood for your real entertainment. But that was kind of bs. So we were just taking the word fire as cool, changing the I to a Y and trying to find a one or two syllable short word that

[Rachel Yukatel]

we could use Cool. And what I think a lot of people don't understand because so many of us have just seen the aftermath. I thought Fire was a festival. I thought this was an event business that was A festival business. But it wasn't that. That was the aftermath or the. Almost like the marketing to an actual tech company. Right.

[Billy McFarland]

The festival itself was like an impulsive marketing idea. And it's kind of ironic that that's what it's known for. Now. Fire was started because I was booking a lot of music artists for these concerts for my, my, my Magnesis cardholders. We did 40 or 50 concerts in New York. We booked mid level hip hop artists mostly to come and perform. And I just realized through that process, like how difficult and how backwards that process was.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Right.

[Billy McFarland]

I had a young business, I had some revenue, I had some budget, and it was so difficult to get in touch with the artists or the managers of the agents. And there was this whole world of smoke and mirrors and, and a lot of like bs, a lot of extra middlemen. So I wanted to create a tech platform where guys like me could get in touch directly with an artist for a sponsorship, an appearance, a performance, whatever it may be. So Fire was made as a tech platform and the festival kind of became this unexpected behemoth of like a marketing aspect that we didn't anticipate in the beginning.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Got it. So for that tech platform, I mean, I found that kind of fascinating because nowadays you have. What's the one where you can. Oh my God, I can't believe I'm blanking on the name. The cameo, like where you can reach people directly. There's a couple versions of that. But also, you know, listen, I've been married. I've wanted to access different people to hire them for occasions. And you do have to go through different platforms. You've got to find the manager. Sometimes they're asking crazy money, you know. So how did it work as a platform? Did you actually just become friends with some of these stars and work that way? Like, how did you even do that? Because that's a great idea, by the way.

[Billy McFarland]

So I had both their relationships with a few dozen of the artists because I'd booked them for Magnesis.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Got it.

[Billy McFarland]

I just kind of got in the habit of once I met them, asking them like, why it was so difficult, like, why did Jim have to call John, who had to call Jerry, who called Patrick? And what I started learning is the amount that I was paying was not actually communicated to the artist. So let's say I paid $10,000. The artist might have gotten $4,000 because he had three or four different middlemen either lying or taking advantage. So the pitch to the artist was that you could actually see what Your real offers are, and you can wake up in the morning and just click yes or click no. So it was found revenue for the talent on the platform, and there was no disadvantage for them being on there. So that was the pitch is like giving them transparency and the ability to say yes or no themselves to whatever offers are coming in for them.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Do you think if you had stuck with that platform and forget the festival part of the marketing, that you could have really built that slowly, but, like, created a whole market for that?

[Billy McFarland]

I think there was definitely a good market for the platform. I was just in this phase where I was living literally by the hour and just trying to sprint and go so quickly. I just didn't have the patience or the wherewithal to really understand how long things should take and how to go through that proper process.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Right. Which now sounds like a little bit of a pattern because you are skipping through the Magnesis stuff as well and wanted to move to the next thing. It sounds like you get excited by projects and the possibilities of them without seeing it through. Like you just said, kind of.

[Billy McFarland]

I think the projects would lead me to a new door that I didn't know existed. I would open the door and then I'd see an even bigger door. Right. Because, like, I think all this action just goes to show you, like, what else is possible in the world. So I kept trying to open and sprint into larger and larger doors without completing the mission in each one of the rooms along the way.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Right. Okay, so now here we are in the conversation to the part where you guys are, what, sitting in a meeting for Fire, for the technology, the platform, and you're like, wait, this is a great idea. We should create a festival. Like, were you having problems with the revenue that you were like, wait, this will make us a lot of money. How did the idea come about so

[Billy McFarland]

totally separate from Fire? I had fallen in love with the islands and ocean and ocean sports at a young age. I've been running small trips for Magnesis customers to the Exuma chain of the Bahamas for years. We would take three or four really small propeller planes that probably shouldn't be able to make it that far, fly from New York to the Bahamas, spend these long weekends in the islands. We'd cook for ourselves and make campfires. We go spear fishing. There's these really fun ways just to get out of the corporate world of New York and take people to a place they probably wouldn't go without us. And those trips were great for a number of years. And as Fire was Starting. And as we were starting to pitch larger artists to join the platform, my unique advantage were these little islands that I had rented in the Bahamas. So I started taking the artists to these islands more for sales trips rather than anything else. And during one of the trips, I brought an old high school friend, and he said, you should totally do a music festival here for all your Magnesis members. So that was the beginning of the end.

[Rachel Yukatel]

That was the beginning of the end. Okay, and how did you become partners with Ja Rule? That always just shocked me as well, sort of random.

[Billy McFarland]

So Ja Rule was one of the artists that had booked a number of times through Magnesis to do concerts for our members. We had the conversations about the transparency, and it got to one time where it was, like, so difficult to get him booked for a show. And when he was finally booked, I just asked him, we're on a helicopter, actually, to our. Our concert in the Hamptons that we booked for Magnesis. I'm like, why the didn't you respond to me for two weeks? He goes, I was just called this morning with the offer. Like, that's when it finally clicked that this made no sense. Right? Here's an artist who wants to show and wants the revenue. Here's a customer who has a seemingly attractive opportunity. Why isn't there a better way to connect these two sides? So we slowly started working On Fire together as a way to fix that problem.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Got it. So now we've all seen the documentary or you haven't, I guess, right?

[Billy McFarland]

No, I've never watched it.

[Rachel Yukatel]

So they do a really good job of giving you the visuals on this original, what I call the original Fyre Festival. You have all these models, you have Ja Rule, you have a bunch of people there with you doing a photo shoot, which looks like an amazing fucking trip. Okay. It looks like that's what this should be.

[Billy McFarland]

The best. The best.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Yeah. The best of the best probably was a great time, but leading up to that, like, all of a sudden, was Ja Rule like, okay, I want to be your partner in this, and this is what we're going to do, or was it, like, fly by the seat of your pants? Like, this seems fun. It's hard, you know, to be in the events business is one whole separate thing from being in the music business, from being, you know, these are all different skills. You have to have to come together. So how did that come about, that you started to put this together to get to that place where it was good, right? Where you had all the people there that's fascinating in itself that you got those people all there.

[Billy McFarland]

Yeah. So great question. So we started it a little bit more, I guess, intellectually. We started Fire together as a company prior to the festival existing, we were equal partners on Fire. And when we spun up the idea for the festival, it was just operating under like the regular Fyre company. So nothing had really changed at that point. We'd work together for however long it took to build the Fhir app and start that business together. And I think momentum is really contagious. Right. And people who are very successful are the best at using momentum to create additional momentum. And that was happening to us initially at a small scale, and then obviously it went big very, very quickly. But I think together we were just really great at playing off each other's strengths and creating this excitement and this momentum that we were dragging in, whether it was great talent, whether it was investors, whether it was brands. And we kind of created this snowball effect where it was getting really big really quickly.

[Rachel Yukatel]

How did you book those models?

[Billy McFarland]

I think the whole concept went from 0 to 100 very fast. I've been doing these trips for years. The initial trips were not talent focused. They were more customer focused for young people like me who thought it was this great escape. And I remember sitting in our office one day and one of my investors introduced me to the president of img, who at the time I think was the premier modeling agency. And I called him and said, hey, we had an idea last weekend to do a festival on this little island. I've been going here for five or six years. It's great. I want these ten models to come. And he literally like laughed me off the phone and like basically said, I took the call to appease your investor, but get lost, kid. So we kind of like worked her way down the list until he hired like a decent talent group, went to the island, and we had this incredible three or four day weekend where everybody came back to New York and said, like, that was the best weekend of my life. Right. And that same guy called me back and said, my entire roster wants to come. Like, what do we do next? So it's like full circle moment where, you know, anything can happen if the momentum there is strong enough.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Right. So do you mean then you went a second time with those top tier models?

[Billy McFarland]

We were basically probably did 10 or 11 different promotional trips. I think one or two were covered at the end of the day, but it was a slow process of being told to get lost to delivering a really good experience for a small group. And then the stories, the tales of what happened on these exotic islands started to grow, right? And then that attracted the larger talent.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Got it. Because they did skip through that then. Because they made it seem like you had one trip and you had everyone from Hailey Bieber to whoever it was. And normally these are people who nowadays would charge hundreds of thousands of dollars to be in one place and get photographed and blah, blah, blah.

[Billy McFarland]

One of the biggest things I talk to new entrepreneurs about all the time is there's this idea where I woke up one day, made a bad spreadsheet, and then raised $30 million with no background. And I think my biggest advice to these people is my worst crime was actually violating the trust. Because the investors, the talent, whatever they were, they had backed me or been working with me for a long period of time before this happened. So I think Netflix tries to make, or not Netflix, the documentary, tried to make this story where I woke up one day and went bad and then everything happen because of that. Where in the reality was, everything was years in the making. And to have a loss that big took dozens and dozens of small wins and small losses along the way to get to that point.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Well, that's a really. I love hearing you say that, because that's really important. I do think that you miss out on that. So you had created this credibility and this trust between a lot of people to be able to get you that much money from investors and for people to take a chance on you. So it wasn't just one day. You were like, hey, I'm this kid and I got all these hot friends and these famous friends and we're just going to do this crazy thing. I mean, you, you up until this point where things started to kind of get out of hand for a series of reasons that we'll get into, you were doing right moves that created the next right move that was giving you that credibility. Right. Would you say the most.

[Billy McFarland]

Most of the actual crime was lying to investors to try to raise money. Most of the capital came from investors who had backed me for five or six years. So when I came to them and said, this has the most potential of anything I've tried so far, and here's why I'm excited about. They weren't in a position to really question what I was saying, because they had seen the small wins, they had seen the failures. They knew the strengths, they knew the weaknesses, and they believed in me. So I think the worst moral and ethical violation was that trust that I abused at the end. It wasn't this Wake up one day and the whole world gives you money because you take a good picture. I hope all entrepreneurs can listen to that and understand it.

[Rachel Yukatel]

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[Billy McFarland]

There's just so many silly decisions where I look back now almost eight or nine years later and just don't really understand the thought process. I think it kind of came down to this Condensed timeline. We were there, my friend said, let's do a music festival. I said, great idea, let's do it in four months. And we kind of set this goal and we told the world this date. And I didn't have any appreciation or understanding of the logistics needed to literally build a city out of nowhere on an island or what it took to actually host thousands of people in a foreign country. So I just didn't really know what I was getting into. And I was so dead set on trying to live up to this date that I promised that I made unethical, bad, whatever you want to call, decisions to try to satisfy this date that was created out of nowhere.

[Rachel Yukatel]

So the big question then is, why didn't you stop it and maybe say, listen, we have due to whatever reasons we need to do this next year.

[Billy McFarland]

Yes, in hindsight, very simple to look back and say we should have stopped it. At numerous points. I think the reality was probably a little bit more nuanced where the second we announced that we have this big festival in four months, every single day brought new challenges and new problems. And we kept finding ways and pulling tricks out of her sleeve to solve larger and larger problems every single day. We probably should have failed four months before the actual festival took place. But it was like this weird combination of random successes that gave us the confidence that we thought we can kept pushing through, when in reality we probably would have stopped ourselves had we not been able to solve these seemingly insurmountable issues earlier on in the process.

[Rachel Yukatel]

So the first couple issues was figuring out the island to use. Right. Because I think you moved the island a couple times.

[Billy McFarland]

Yeah. So probably the biggest miss on my part was we rented an island that's a decently well known island in the Exumas. It was Pablo Escobar's former, like, henchman's Island, I think is the best way to put it. And they made it clear to us that we couldn't say it was Pablo Escobar's island.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Right.

[Billy McFarland]

We launched a trailer with a lot of the talent that we've referenced that people know about. And 30 seconds into the trailer, we're like, on Pablo Escobar's former island. So the day after the trailer comes out, the island owner just calls me and is like, I'm going to sue you if you don't get the fuck off my ass island. So we were quickly displaced from our home.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Okay, so quick question. If you had been able to keep it on that island, would that have changed the outcome?

[Billy McFarland]

It's so Hard to say. I mean, we were pretty probably screwed anyway. It's really difficult to like add up which problem actually took us over the edge. I was in like a really bad plane situation this weekend and we were stuck in fog over the mountains and I thought that was going to be it. But they teach you in pilot school that like one issue never crashes the plane. It's when like 6, 7, 8, 9 issues stack up. When they all kind of come together, that's a crashes the plane. So I think the similar thing happened with like with us. The island itself wasn't enough, the storm wasn't enough, the investor credibility wasn't enough. But it was a combination of a lot of mishaps that led to the large failure.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Right. How much of your own money had you were you putting in at this time?

[Billy McFarland]

I think I lost like in cash, 2ish million dollars, my personal money. I lost all the value of my equity though, in most of my other businesses because whatever they were valued at legitimately went pretty much to zero after fire crashed.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Right, you mean because your credibility crashed with it, essentially.

[Billy McFarland]

Exactly, exactly. I think when it came time actually to get sentenced for my crime, the fact that I had lost my own money really helped. If I had taken $10 million and went and bought a couple of houses, I think the outcome would have been far worse.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Right, so. So again, I wanna talk about just two more things on that. Cause I found it fascinating. So you had this terrible luck with Mother Nature. One of the problems the night before, and there's a rainstorm and everything goes to shit. Now before this, you guys hadn't constructed great tents and options and blah, blah, blah. Do you think that if that storm had not happened, could you have pulled off having people be okay with these hurricane tents and these random mattresses and the cheese plate or it was that you saw on TikTok. Like, could people have gotten over that if it wasn't soaking wet?

[Billy McFarland]

That's a good question. I think, like, if I look at it quickly, I'm like, if there was no storm, the festival would have proceeded. Then if I take a more like, intellectual approach, it's like the storm was one of 10 issues and if there wasn't a storm, something else might have happened that I just can't guess right now. That would have put it over the edge. I think in like the last moments, if there was an earth storm, it would have proceeded. But that's not to say something else wouldn't have popped up that I just couldn't have guessed. Right. And Took us over the edge. And something as simple as we had one water line into the area where the festival was, where people were staying. And one of my investor sons was a 17 year old intern. We gave him the keys to our box truck and he ran over the water line, took the water out the last second. That by itself wouldn't be enough to kill us. But who's not to say that something else wouldn't have happened given the lack of resources.

[Rachel Yukatel]

I hear you. A part of the story is you have somebody that has known you for a long time. I think his name is Andy, right? Andy King? Is that his name?

[Billy McFarland]

Yes.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Okay. He is in the documentary. I'm sure you've heard the story already. But he says that there was one part where kind of a day before, whatever, you ran into an issue with somebody not releasing water for the whole island. And you basically say to him, listen, I need you to do me a favor. I need you to take one for the team and I need you to basically suck this. This guy's dick. And he says this great story. He's a very likable guy where he showers up, puts on cologne, goes down there and is literally ready to suck this guy's dick. And fortunately for him, for everybody, whatever, he doesn't have to. Did that story really happen?

[Billy McFarland]

So I learned about this story in jail. The documentaries came out when I was in prison and this one prison guard who was always a little sneaky just came up to me and he's like, mcfarland, did you pay some guy to suck some custom officials dick for water? I'm like looking at him like, this guy's crazy. He's like, no, no, no, you can tell me. It's okay. Like, I'm just totally confused. I have no idea what this guy is talking about. I'm like, what are they claiming I did now? And then I think my family came to visit me like a day or two later and tell me what happened. So, yeah, learned about that in jail. So that was a little wild.

[Rachel Yukatel]

So it didn't happen?

[Billy McFarland]

No, it didn't happen. I spoke with him years later on a podcast and he's like, oh, someone called me and said, like Billy said, do whatever it takes. And. And I guess I'm not sure how that.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Yeah, he had elaborated in his mind based on what he probably wanted to do or whatever.

[Billy McFarland]

Okay. Maybe he wanted the different outcome. I don't know.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Right, right, right. Okay. All right. So in real time. Cause again, in the documentary, there's a lot of video happening and you see you standing on a table or something and you're just telling people to calm down or get a drink or whatever in real time. And then there's, you know, you're panicking, you're walking back and forth. Tell me about the day when you were there. And they all start to get off the plane and it's day one and things are literally, they can't go any worse in real time. How did that feel?

[Billy McFarland]

I didn't know we were in trouble until I was standing on this milk carton. I know there's a picture that got circulated where like I'm like a 4 day old T shirt trying to like calm the crowd down. And my head of operations came up to me with a phone call. I was like, billy, you have to take this. And I'm speaking to a reporter from a, you know, fairly large tabloid and someone's live streaming me on the homepage of that tabloids website. And the reporter goes, we heard you ran away on your yacht with a bunch of models in cocaine. I didn't have a yacht, I didn't have any cocaine. And I respond back to the reporter saying, you guys are literally live streaming me right now, talking to you in a sea of people right here. And she said, I have two credible sources, I'm running the story. So it was like that moment where I realized that all the mistakes I had made were, were so bad and became so big that it was at the point where the truth no longer mattered. And the salacious aspect of the story was like so good that there is nothing that could have been done to save us at that point.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Right. So what did you do from that point on? How many days did you stay? How did people finally get off the island?

[Billy McFarland]

So just to kind of get back to the crazy issues we solved, one of the big issues was transportation, right? We literally rented two 737 planes for like two weeks because we had the festival over two weekends. We opened up a fire terminal at Miami International Airport. We painted one of the planes with girls in bikinis and our fire logo is pretty. A 24 year old boys dream. So kind of absurd to look back on. And we were running the planes back and forth all day long, bringing guests. The first 1,000 guests had arrived. We canceled the event shortly after. I was on that milk carton and remember making the call to the airport, who then radioed the pilot and they turned one of the planes back in the air that was already on the way from Miami with the guests. And that's kind of when all hell broke loose, right?

[Rachel Yukatel]

So I assume then it's like phone calls and DMs and people that are upset want their money back, people trying to get home, and then the fallout of just everything, you know? So, like, what are those moments, like that day, that next day, the third day? Like, what are you doing? You're just going home and saying, oh, my God, or what?

[Billy McFarland]

I think the weirdest this thing finally occurred when one of my investors, who I had highly respected and a politically involved person, very smart guy, he called me and basically said whatever money that him and his friends had invested, it was a handful of million dollars. He's like, I need that back right now, or else you're going to be on the front page of the Wall Street Journal in handcuffs. And I never fathomed what I had done was actually a real federal crime. I knew it was wrong, but I was so driven by this idea that if I just make Fyre Festival happen, all the investors will be happy, whether that's making money, whether that's the social currency they get for backing this business that was doing something. I just felt like I had to make this happen and everybody would then like me and be okay with it. And once I got that phone call from a guy I really loved and respected, and it just became so black and white. I need this back or else this is going to happen. And all the, like, the bank accounts, the credit card accounts, they were all frozen within hours of the festival being canceled. So this really weird time where I finally realized that I was in trouble.

[Rachel Yukatel]

So explain that to me, because I think a lot of people would wonder, how much did you actually get? Wasn't like $28 million you were able to raise or something?

[Billy McFarland]

I think we raised between 25 and 30 million over that 4ish months for the festival.

[Rachel Yukatel]

And how much did you still have in accounts that you were able to say, okay, it didn't work, I can pay it back back.

[Billy McFarland]

We probably had a 4 or 5 million in the accounts like that. That, like that second. And it was all frozen, you know, within hours of the festival being canceled.

[Rachel Yukatel]

And how does that work? The. The government eventually decides who gets what?

[Billy McFarland]

I'm not sure initially. I don't know if the government froze it or if, like, the credit card processing companies and the banks saw the news, right? And like, even like our. Our Stripe account that customers were using to process payments, I think we had like $700,000 in payments that came in the day before. And Stripe's like, hold on. They Even froze that money right before we can get it. It's, like, unsure of where the money should go. I don't really know how everything's been distributed. I think that wasn't really clear to me. What I do know is that I pay restitution now. So every single month I have to give a check back to the government, and that gets distributed equally to all the investors.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Okay, so I want to hear about that, but I want to hear about something else. Why were you the only one that got in trouble?

[Billy McFarland]

I was definitely the most responsible, like, zero question. I think I was certainly the one that's like, okay, I'm going to start lying how to raise the money. I was the one responsible for raising the money. So I think that makes the most sense, ironically, and I tell a lot of entrepreneurs is now that I meet is that the majority of the investors knew I was lying to them and they invested despite that. And had I been honest, I think they would have given me more money and gave it to me quicker. So what I thought was a shortcut was actually harming me the entire way. So that was like a really interesting lesson learned.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Wow. Okay, so the FBI gets involved, you eventually get arrested and kind of catch us up on that. Was there a trial? Did you. What. What happened?

[Billy McFarland]

I was arrested. I landed back in New York. The. The festival was taking place Thursday through Sunday for the weekend. We cancel it early Thursday morning. I get back to New York around midnight Sunday night into Monday morning. And then the FBI was there at like 5am So I was home for a handful of hours before they arrived very long.

[Rachel Yukatel]

But then you bailed out, right? Because I, like, we see some video of you hanging out in some amazing house. What happened there?

[Billy McFarland]

Out on bail. Out on bail for a year. I had my bail revoked, which was insanely stupid, and was ultimately sentenced to six years.

[Rachel Yukatel]

But in your time that you were out, how were you still funding yourself? You were creating new ideas for things like what was happening.

[Billy McFarland]

So I was really desperate to try to make money. When I was out on bail, everything I had, like, literally got frozen. I know I had very few things left at that point. And I was just like, so desperate to pay this investor the dollar figure that he was requesting. And it was an unreasonable amount of money to make, like in this situation or in any period of time given, like my current circumstances, trying to find ways to make money. I was, you know, still trying to book artists for little concerts. I was selling tickets for events that I previously had access to but wasn't Getting any more and more. I was a mess and I was spinning and spiraling and trying to find a way to pay this guy or else I was going to go to jail. Not realizing it was already too late and I was going to go to jail anyway.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Did you think you were going to go to jail?

[Billy McFarland]

I didn't think so initially. Really good question. I don't know. I knew what I did was wrong and I guess I was just so convinced that this person kind of gave me this dollar figure that I had to pay this much money. I was just like tunnel vision where, okay, I gotta get this guy 5 million bucks, whatever the number was, right. Like, that's all I was focused on and I kind of drowned out the rest of the problems, which was wrong.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Yeah. When they finally told you, oh, first of all, did you have anyone on your side while you were out on bail? Did you have some good friends? Were your parents with you?

[Billy McFarland]

I definitely had friends and family. And I think I would tell everybody this if you had told me in the peak of the times before anything went wrong wrong. If something, if a tragedy happened, who would have been there? I probably would have gotten every single person wrong. And that was like a really interesting experience. I think, surprisingly, a lot of the people that were victims, according to the court, whether they were the bigger investors or whatever, they were almost the most understanding and some of the people who actually gained the most, whether they were highly paid employees, whether they're people who somehow were getting money that was falling off the truck, if you will, along the way, they were the fastest to leave. So that was a really kind of interesting way to look back and try to understand like the behavior energy that I was putting out and like what I was attracting and why so much of that was wrong.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Before we move on from the documentary, there was a young guy and I'm gonna blank on his name. He was like your director of events or something. The short guy with the glasses. Do you know who I'm talking about? Who seemed very focused on making everything happen. What was his name?

[Billy McFarland]

Grant. He's a beast. I haven't spoken to him, but he was like, he's probably not a victim in the sense of the court. I think in my side he was. He was a young guy, extremely talented. I think the hate there is unwarranted and I don't know if he's been able to bounce back from the public backlash that happened. And like, that's what kills me because there's a 23 year old kid who literally had the world by the balls and, like, he could have done whatever he wanted in his life. Right. And my mistakes led to a lot of backlash there that stunted his. His development and growth. So, you know, guys like that or girls like that, I feel really, really bad for.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Yeah. There was also a woman, if you'll recall, from the Bahamas, I guess, who felt like all her staff weren't paid. She ended up having to pay $50,000 out of her own savings and had no money. Do you know who I'm referring to?

[Billy McFarland]

I do. I'd never met her, and I think this is what really kills me. And I just don't really know how to respond to this. I think so much of the real crime and even the moral violations that might not have been criminal, they are glossed over. And I think that was my biggest issue with the documentaries is. Is new crimes were invented when there were so many real ones that could have been focused on. I think just like, the easiest way to respond to that is Bahamian employees, they don't, like, take net 180 days for their payment. Right. They're paid that day or that week or they're not showing up. So it's just not possible. Someone worked for four months without getting paid.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Got it. So you believe that they were paid?

[Billy McFarland]

Yes. I never met this woman. I was told later on what happened, but, yeah, unfortunately, that story is not true.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Yeah. Okay, so you are talking about restitution before, for people listening that don't understand it. What were you eventually charged with, and what was the restitution? What did you have to give back?

[Billy McFarland]

So I was charged with wire fraud. And what that meant was the money raised from investors, I had to have to basically pay back. So it's pretty simple in theory. I owe whatever the investors invested back to them, and I have to pay, like, literally every single month. I have to go and give a check back to the court, and then that gets distributed to the investor group.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Wow. So what did the ultimate number end up at that you owed?

[Billy McFarland]

It was high. 20 million, 26, 27 million. And I think it depends on the hour. It's changed a couple of times. I'm not really sure.

[Rachel Yukatel]

And the restitution started after you got out of prison, or how does that work?

[Billy McFarland]

I think it's assigned right away, but it starts being collected after jail.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Got it. And then does it work that they take a certain percentage of what you're making to decide, or you have to give your whole check to the court? Like, how does that. That work?

[Billy McFarland]

It's a certain percentage. And if I were to earn a lump sum, they might take a little bit more. So it kind of goes up or down based on, like, what the income levels are.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Okay, so now I want to get into. Well, let's talk about prison for a second. What was that like? You were there for four years out of six?

[Billy McFarland]

I served four. Worst part of prison that no one tells you is that the punishment is hardest on your innocent friends and family. I think once you're, like, physically going through something and you have have real time updates, it's doable. When someone loves you and cares about you and they have no visibility into what's going on, they mentally go to the worst possible place. So that's something I didn't know about jail. And for everybody I met in there, the people who cared about them had it worse than the people actually inside.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Wow. What an interesting answer, Billy. So, but what was a day in the life for you? Was it a. Were you in a cell? Were you with a whole group of people in one big room?

[Billy McFarland]

I went to four or five different prisons, so I experienced it all from being locked in a cell to open dorm rooms and everything in between. Met a lot of really good friends, which I think people are also surprised by. I think it kind of goes to this concept where there are very few really bad people in the world. And maybe like 1 or 2% of the guys in jail were actually like, psychopaths who need to stay there forever. The rest were desperate. And whether they sold drugs or got a gun or whatever the situation may have been, is the desperation pushed people to make bad decisions. Right. Like, and I was arguably more guilty than most because I didn't need to do what I did at that point in my life. So that was kind of an eye opening experience.

[Rachel Yukatel]

But on a daily basis, were you so depressed, Was there a time you wanted to just kill yourself? Did you think it would never end? Or were you able to sort of say, okay, I'm here, I'm gonna be in the moment, and I'm not gonna worry about six years from now or four years from now.

[Billy McFarland]

Now I wish I had the ability to live in the moment. I think you. I was 25, I believe, when I was. When I went. And at that time, I was like, literally living by the day, trying to survive. Whether it's survive with the business or survive on bail. So to hear, like six years at that point in my life, it might as well have been decades. I think once you're in a really bad spot, too. You start, you start realizing just how bad things can go. And like, I was like shortly into prison when my lawyer at the time told me, like, there is no rock bottom, it can always get worse. It was kind of like this mentality where like things could always get worse. And once you kind of lose any ability to control your short term destiny, your brain always starts thinking to like these worst case scenarios. So it's a pretty, yeah, pretty terrible existence where you're always worried about like, what's the possible worst thing that can happen next.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Right. So in jail, I mean, you have a mind that works somewhat different than other people, I feel like. So were you kind of trying to create new things for when you got out? Were you thinking about thinking of things that you could do to have a purpose? I feel like you're the type of person that needs a purpose to really thrive.

[Billy McFarland]

The worst part for me, outside of the hearing a family or friend over the phone and just being worthless, was waking up every day and literally having no ability to impact anything around you. The prison system is designed to remove your creativity. If you're a bad person, you're a murderer, you're a rapist, you don't want that person to be inspired. So. So everything is designed just to strip you down to being robotic. And I was trying very hard to kind of fight against that and trying to try to keep creativity. I was writing a lot, doing a lot of meditation, but it's tough to be in an environment where they want to turn you into a literal human robot. And you're trying with every ounce of your energy to not kind of fall into this institutionalized tunnel vision.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Right. When you finally heard you were getting out two years early, how did that phone call go?

[Billy McFarland]

I didn't believe it. And I, and I think like going back to once you prior to the failure of Fire, I didn't really know the severity of consequences of my actions at that point in my life. Right. I had been, I had guardrails up as a young man with a like supportive family, supportive friends. Like things that went bad never really went that bad until they were, they were terrible. Yeah, yeah. Once I was told that I was being released soon, I think it was like 60 or 70 days before the actual release date. That was probably the worst. 60 or 70 days, like physically and mentally my entire life where I'd wake up and go to bed every single night just like knowing something was going to go wrong tomorrow.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Right.

[Billy McFarland]

Someone show up and say it was a joke. Someone would say there's More charges. Someone would say, like, your family's no longer around. Like, I was expecting there to be, like, that worst case scenario. And that was a really rough period. Period. I had a good friend who was serving 25 years, and maybe a year or so after I left, he was called and told he was going home in 30 days early, like 10 or 15 years early in his sentence. And he died of a heart attack. And I think that becomes the hardest when there's finally some light at the end of the tunnel. And then you've been through so much hell and so much bad experiences that you're just really worried about what could possibly happen next.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Yeah. You said you became friends with a lot of people. Do you still reach out to them? Do you call the prison at first?

[Billy McFarland]

I do. I actually went to visit a friend in prison twice over the past month and a half, and that was my first time going back and first time going back as a visitor. I literally almost cried in the visiting room. It was fucking scary, right?

[Rachel Yukatel]

Cried because you were scared or cried because you were like, oh, I kind of miss the people here?

[Billy McFarland]

No, I wasn't crying for him. I was crying for my own fear. It's like, this is a really, really, really scary, scary place. And it's like hearing the doors clang and slam. And even though I was allowed to leave at the end of the visit, it was a traumatizing experience.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Right. So how long now have you been out?

[Billy McFarland]

Almost four years.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Okay, four years. So why get back into things? Because I know that right when you got back, you went back into it and you kind of announced. I don't know if it was somewhat soon, but I remember seeing, we're doing Fyre Festival 2. Here we go again. This is, you know, this is what we're doing. Was it the motivation because you knew you had this restitution and how the hell were you going to do that? Or was it like, wait a minute, I want to show people that I learned from my. My. My bad experience and I'm going to make it right.

[Billy McFarland]

So the number one goal is I. I have this, like, reoccurring dream where I can go and shake the hands of every single person that I believe I wronged. And for them to recognize that I did what it took to. To pay it back. And that doesn't necessarily mean money. For some of them, it's certainly about the money. For others, it's not. It's the trust. It's showing them the intentions in the future. You know, everybody kind of has their Own their own things they want to see.

[Rachel Yukatel]

So.

[Billy McFarland]

So I want to show people that I paid it back in every possible way. And I felt like the only way to do it was to go and try to make a big positive impact. And then two is I'm really scared of being completely powerless when I had no money and I was in prison and had nothing left. I'm a juicy target and with no resources to protect myself, that was a really scary situation. So understanding, I probably had two paths to take, which is like literally do nothing right, and then no one cares about you and you're fine. People aren't going to bother you if you take the middle road. I'm a juicy target, but I don't have the resources or the connections or the ability to defend myself. And that's not going to end well. Or go big and try to pay people back and try to amass enough resources and value to others that I'm somewhat protected. So that's kind of how I viewed the world and decided to try to take that third path and make as much of an impact as possible.

[Rachel Yukatel]

I want to get into how you got people to trust you again to go down that path with you. But first, like literally when you got out of prison and you had nothing to your name, how do you like. I know I've heard you say a couple times you talk to entrepreneurs when people are starting from the bottom, like, how did you do that? Did you have to go live with your. In your parents couch? Did you like, how do you start that motivation to be like, okay, I'm gonna go big, but here's how I gotta do it.

[Billy McFarland]

So I had to go to a halfway house for a couple of months. When I was released, it was like a mandated part of the relationship lease. My parents picked me up, they gave me $200 in 20s, like a timberland wallet and go get them and an iPhone. So I was like drove with them in the car from I think I was in Detroit, Michigan to the halfway house in Brooklyn. I'm on the phone just trying to call everybody and anybody the people that I pick, thought would pick up. Most of them didn't pick up. And an old friend, not going to say who he was, but someone who I had not stayed in touch with when I was in prison. Prison. I called him, he picked up immediately. He's like, how can I help you? I said, the halfway house requires me to get a job for me to leave the halfway house. He goes, all right, can you start right now? He's like, Write your own offer letter and come and show up. So got to the halfway house. I think I was out of the door an hour later and just basically hanging with him at his apartment in New York. And he helped me get back on my feet.

[Rachel Yukatel]

No way. That's a great friend. So were you guys trying to come up with ideas then or he had an actual job for you to do working for him.

[Billy McFarland]

He's a super established guy, well known guy. I'm not gonna say who he is, but he basically gave me a job and like that allowed me the freedom to get back to life. He would. I could host meetings at his house. You know, I had everybody coming to see me, so kind of like set up base camp at his house and it was really let me get back on my feet.

[Rachel Yukatel]

And what was your original plan? Where immediately were you? Like, we've got to retry this. We've got to do Fyre too.

[Billy McFarland]

I always knew I was going to do Fyre Festival 2 again. I was on probation and they had the ability to revoke your probation at any time for three years and basically send you back to jail for three years for or any violation that could be as simple as not picking up the phone or showing up late or doing a business they didn't approve of. So there's a little bit of a process of just like having to rebuild that trust before I could, before I went crazy with it. But the goal was to always make fire to happen.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Okay. And that story of getting out of prison and starting up your ideas and getting the trust back and getting the people to start working with you, was that a slow burn or were people like, yeah, man, let's go.

[Billy McFarland]

I think it took a one on one conversation with every single person, including immediate family. I'm sure you've experienced this in different ways, but when you're not there to defend yourself, even people who know you really well, if they keep hearing the stories about you, they start to question their own beliefs. So I'd physically see this switch where I'd be with somebody for five minutes and they'd be like, oh, okay. It's the same Billy, the same flaws, the same strengths, whatever that he was 10 years ago. Not to the extreme that I was told by the news for the past six years. So it took that one on one touch point with every single person. And I just didn't anticipate any of that having to happen. So it was a slow burn to just like get back with every person in my life.

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[Rachel Yukatel]

What do you think the flaws were that you figured out in yourself that you were like, listen, this is what I cannot do going forward. Otherwise I'm gonna end up either in jail again or with no friends or no money or whatever.

[Billy McFarland]

I think one of the biggest things and like this is, this is not like a moral issue, was just wanting to be around and wanting to be liked by a lot of people. And I think that led to just so many bad decisions or led to desperate positions where I had hundreds of employees that I didn't need because I liked the idea of being around a lot of people. I was moving really quickly and I think motivated a lot by short term goals or statuses or money. And that attracted other people who also shared those goals. So I think I was kind of putting out this vibe and attracting people who also had that same energy. And that led to a lot of my bad decisions to try to maintain that lifestyle or maintain the size of that business or maintain that speed. So really just valuing a few small relationships and putting that first and saying, like, fuck the rest of the world. I care about these five people. I think that that's probably been the best, like, mental switch for me.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Very smart. What's your relationship like with Ja Rule now?

[Billy McFarland]

There's no relationship.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Okay.

[Billy McFarland]

So, yeah, I was. Yeah, my lawyer said if I, if I ever called him again at that point, they would stop representing me. And I couldn't afford more lawyers at the time, so I had to stop going.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Do you think that he helped or pushed you in the way that he wanted? This cool friend that was creating these cool parties? I mean, do you think he had any responsibility in at least enabling your behavior?

[Billy McFarland]

Look, I was definitely driving the car, but all the passengers were bumping the music too. Right. It was a fun ride. And we all knew that if we executed this, there would have been benefits for all of us. Whether, you know, you were an employee, whether you were a partner, whether you were an investor. We all kind of knew like, what the potential was. And we were all, I think in some way, all blinded by that. But I was the one who was ultimately signing off on the bad ideas.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Do you feel like any of them let you take the fall more than you should have had to by yourself?

[Billy McFarland]

Look, I think if it's. Most people naturally will do anything to avoid punishment. I, I'm not sure if I'm supposed to say this. I remember the. When the FBI, you know, picked me up, when I was getting released on bail from the prison, they're like one of the people who, who threw me under the bus really quickly. They're like, damn, that guy would have fucking sold his mom out in 30 seconds. Like, save his ass. And like, like, just like when, when they said that to me, it was just like really, really interesting how the people I was attracting and energy I was attracting was like, how can we individually be as happy or as hedonistic or as successful as possible immediately and not care about anybody else? So yeah, it's kind of like a. I had some really shitty behavior and I think it attracted some bad people too.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Yeah, I hear that. Are any of the people that you decided to have come work in Fyre Festival 2, were they any of the people that were working with you the first time around that believed in you enough again to come back for a second round?

[Billy McFarland]

Great questions. None of the three or four core people that are probably covered in the documentaries, but a lot of the behind the scenes people, whether they were advisors, mentors, have a lot of friends in the Bahamas still, you know, so a lot of the same like support cast has been there, which is great.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Any of the investors?

[Billy McFarland]

I'm not allowed to raise money again, so I haven't raised money from any of the investors, but some of them have been like, really supportive and you know, ways they didn't expect. And every three or four months I'll get a random like, you know, text from someone saying, XYZ is trying to reach you, you know, can I connect you guys? And so it's, it's good to hear from, from them.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Got it. Okay. So we start to see that you get on social media and you're like, Fyre Festival 2, it's happening. Can you kind of walk us through what happened there? And did you announce it before you, you know, got too far along in the game of planning again this time? Cause for people that are listening, you announced it and it ended up having to be came canceled.

[Billy McFarland]

So we didn't really. I thought people would rush to a Fyre Festival too. And I was probably listening and just like thinking a little bit too much, like ironically. Right. If I went to the opposite direction, where it was. Instead of, like, immediate action, it was like, a lot of, like, planning without action. And we said, let's just do a test where we put 100 tickets on sale, where all the money went into, like, a escrow account. And we said, we're doing Fyre Festival 2. We don't know when, we don't know where, and want to see what would happen. And the ticket sold out. And, like, really, really quickly. News went viral. Probably could have sold thousands more than we did in the presale. And that kicked off a process of literally scouring the world to find a venue for Fire2. We spoke with governments from seven or eight different countries. We spoke with production companies from all these countries. And we were ultimately pitched by Mexico in a group in Mexico to do Fyre Festival 2 in Mexico. So signed a deal. We went and announced the location, the dates, and everything in Mexico. And after the media storm took place, where all these articles came out, the reporters were calling Mexico. The local government in Mexico issued a statement saying they never heard of Fire or Fyre Festival.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Yeah. So what happened there?

[Billy McFarland]

It was like, whether the scammer got scammed is like, kind of the ironic headline, but that's like the. That's a short version of it. And it was this really weird situation where. Where we had a partner, we delivered what we said we were going to deliver. They did a public press conference with us with their government. They gave permits, they gave statements, they issued all the support for us. And as soon as the media came out and said they never heard a fire, it was this really weird situation. And I was immediately called by probation. And they're like, why are you scamming again? Why does Mexico say this? And what saved me was on the official page, the Mexican government on their official Instagram account, like, go, go, Mexico. They had a carousel of, like, 20 pictures where they're like, we're so excited to announce Fyre Festival and support them. And they had the pictures of all their officials and my team, et cetera. And like, four posts after that, that is official statement saying, we've never heard of Fyre Festival. So they're both up at exactly the same time. So.

[Rachel Yukatel]

So what does that mean? You think that because of the media scrutiny or the media coming in, somebody got cold feet and said, forget it, or, like, what?

[Billy McFarland]

And I've seen that in many ways over the. It's really easy to think something is a great idea and fully support it. And when things are, like, looking great, they'll they'll back it. And then when the New York Times starts calling your family, asking you about other issues totally unrelated to us. Right. You get scared. And it's pretty easy to say, oh, we don't know Billy from Mexico, then to say that, you know, yeah, we're standing behind him.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Got it. So that's how it made it look like you had planned another one, and then it had to be canceled.

[Billy McFarland]

Yeah. And the toughest part was I wasn't allowed to travel at this point. So we had a local. Local production company that does big festivals in Mexico that we were relying on. But I think not being there in person also had a lot to do with it. It's much easier to say, we don't know Billy. Right. If Billy's associates are here, but Billy's not here.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Got it.

[Billy McFarland]

Then there in person. And when we ultimately did Fire two back in December, I was able to travel. I was on the ground. And, yeah, I think that's why the outcome was much different.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Right, okay, got it. So now at some point, you had to announce, did you have to give those tickets back or something? Like, how did that.

[Billy McFarland]

Yeah, we refunded all the tickets for Fire too. And then. Then we ended up inviting those people who pre purchased those tickets, even though they were funded for free, to the festival. We did finally, in the Caribbean in December of last year.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Got it. And you called that Phoenix?

[Billy McFarland]

I think we called it Phoenix. It was the Fire vision. It was the entire Fire concept. We changed the name. I was there in person.

[Rachel Yukatel]

How many people went to that?

[Billy McFarland]

400 people from Phoenix. Honduras had been in the mix to host the original Fire 2. From the beginning, they had been giving us great offers, great opportunities, great support. We said no to them to go with Mexico. When Mexico failed, they called Honduras back. And to their defense, everything they promised us, they stood up to it. The media called. They stood right by us. They said, we love this. We want here. And yeah, they really supported us and they helped make it happen.

[Rachel Yukatel]

So it was essentially your version of Fyre Festival 2, just under a different branding name and a small.

[Billy McFarland]

Correct.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Oh, okay. Well, that makes sense. That's exciting. So now, didn't you have to. Didn't you sell the. The brand or the name of Fyre Festival?

[Billy McFarland]

We sold the name of Fyre. We did a number of different licensing deals. There is a Fyre Festival musical being made by one group. There's a Fire music streaming service made by another group. And then we sold the festival name to a third group. So a few different companies Are building their own versions of it.

[Rachel Yukatel]

But explain that to me. No offense, but I don't understand that. If you had Fyre Fest, all that didn't happen twice, how is there value in that? Like, did you make a lot of money and why would anyone try to? I mean, it's a great name and all, but it's not like no one thinks of the stigma that goes along with it.

[Billy McFarland]

So the reason why I sold it was I was scared that even in Honduras, where they had proved everything they told us that they would stand up by that. I was scared that the media would still be so strong against Fire that they would get cold feet at of the day, the end. End. So I felt like it was safest where it was called Phoenix. Like billing plus Phoenix is more palatable than Billy plus Fire. Now it's like my entire logic. I don't know after operating there, if it would have been a problem, I think they still would have stood strong. But we sold it to avoid that issue and realized, like, the vision in the business is what I wanted to build. It wasn't necessarily the name, right? The companies that bought the name Fire without Fire happening. Fire was the most talked about music festival in the world for eight years. So. So I think there is a ton of upside for someone to come in and do it Right. I do think that with me executing Phoenix, it might have taken away a little bit from that, but I do think there is still some opportunity for Fire.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Did you get a lot of money for being able to sell it?

[Billy McFarland]

We got more money for the licensing deals that haven't been publicly released than the actual sale price. So we put the festival Fyre Festival rights on ebay and a company called Limewire bought those.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Oh, wow.

[Billy McFarland]

And that was actually a smaller check size than we got for other licensing deals for the brand, so we didn't get that much.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Got it. All right, so. And how's it going with your restitution? Like every month? Is it really hard to part with this huge chunk or are you living okay now? Like, how does that work with your current life?

[Billy McFarland]

Yeah, some months good, some months bad. I do a lot of marketing consulting work. I do a lot of media and TV work. We just did our Phoenix festival. We filmed, or we have been filming, a documentary called Fire 2 that that covered the entire situation in Mexico, from the days we thought that Mexico was our holy grail to the failure there, to literally moving to Honduras and figuring out renting an island, doing a festival in Honduras, to everything we've been doing Recently. So that documentary has been helpful and do a lot of like branding that

[Rachel Yukatel]

you own, right, that you can sell to a, a streaming network or whatever as opposed to they just have you as a talking head.

[Billy McFarland]

I sold the rights so I maintain a minority share of it and we were paid basically for the rights to documentary. But once it sells to a network, you know, there will hopefully be some additional revenue there.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Got it. So what are you doing now? I saw on your Instagram you have gone back to some sort of technology company or something. What are you doing now?

[Billy McFarland]

So doing a lot of media marketing and artist related work. So helping artists with promotion, brand appearance deals, so building some kind of platforms back in the early Fire space help a lot of like venture capital backed startups get access to talent and do marketing deals and then do a lot of different media promotional stuff myself as well. So excited for all that. I think the Fyre Festival musical, which I have like zero day to day role in it, I think that has some potential. So yeah, just try to do as much as possible.

[Rachel Yukatel]

You said musical, Is that what you said?

[Billy McFarland]

There's a Fyre Festival musical being made by a different group that did a licensing deal as well.

[Rachel Yukatel]

That's insane. I can't wait to see how that turns out. They're gonna have like a dancing Billy and like so fun.

[Billy McFarland]

I can't sing or dance but they know that. That's what I think it's like, like hopefully they let me mess it up somehow at least in like the opening night just so I can get them right.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Right. Couple more questions. So what do you think you finally got right out of all of this people?

[Billy McFarland]

I think the, the team that did the Phoenix Festival undertaking was similar in that we, we literally rented a little island in the Caribbean ocean off Honduras that had nothing on it and we, we built everything for the festival Festival. So we kind of took that same crazy undertaking. Our team was 15 or 20 people instead of 700. The kind of core group. There were people I had known for 13, 14 years pre fire, who weren't involved in fire, who, you know, had stuck by me. So I think it was like working with a group of people that we really like, loved each other in different ways, where we weren't coming together just for the success of Phoenix. We were in it for the long term together and taking our time and finding a location that really supported us.

[Rachel Yukatel]

So who was the musician you had for you?

[Billy McFarland]

I had 14 artists at Phoenix. It was French Montana, Bobby Shmurda, Sloan, Jimmy from the group, Ray Shremmert, who was supposed to perform with the first Fyre Festival. So I thought that was fun. And then a dozen or so DJs got it.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Okay, fun. Do you think that you're gonna redo this once a year? Do you think you'll have a country version or maybe like a yacht rock version? Those are more my speed.

[Billy McFarland]

So we will definitely do Phoenix at least annually on the same island in Honduras.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Cool.

[Billy McFarland]

We're working with a couple of other island countries now after the success of that, who want different versions. Some want electronic versions, some want pop versions. So we'll be announcing this summer a couple other alternative versions of Phoenix in different Caribbean destinations.

[Rachel Yukatel]

I'm assuming that credibility of having Phoenix go well is going to help you in the future.

[Billy McFarland]

It really helped. And I think it should showed, if nothing else, it showed the intentions were always there. And the intention wasn't to do a fake festival to scan money. The intention was to always do a festival. The way went about it was wrong. But the end goal was always the same.

[Rachel Yukatel]

How much money do you still owe?

[Billy McFarland]

I owe a lot. I don't know what the number is. I pay every month based on what I earn. And some months are great, some months are slowly.

[Rachel Yukatel]

But are we still over $20 million that you still owe?

[Billy McFarland]

Yes. So if the restitution was like 7 or 8 million and I. And I pay a percentage, I have not made like, you know, 50 plus million in the past three or four years.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Right, right. Okay. Yeah. Do you think you've changed or do you think you've just gotten smarter through this whole thing?

[Billy McFarland]

Definitely changed. I think like from 24 to 34. As you know what, I was like an immature boy to hopefully closer to a man now. Right. I think we all change. I think four years in prison in your mid-20s certainly made me grow up. And those are kind of weird years, I think, to miss. And a lot of my friends who weren't involved related to my businesses. Just seeing them before I went to jail and after I went to jail, they've changed a lot too. So I think it's kind of like a critical period of time in a young man's life. Yeah. Growing up a lot. And I think it's just really simple, just prioritizing smaller groups of people and smaller relationships and not trying to make people happy and realizing that by doing that I'm often hurting people I care about to make someone I just met happy. In the short term, sure.

[Rachel Yukatel]

If I gave you one sentence to tell people who think you're A fraud. What would you say

[Billy McFarland]

takes care of people around him and never gives up? So I think that's kind of like, definition. I want to live and die by good.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Do you think you're misunderstood? And if so, what's the biggest misunderstanding about you?

[Billy McFarland]

Interesting. I don't know if I'm misunderstood. I think that I've just, like, made a lot of bad decisions in a short period of time and had a magnifying glass. And those bad decisions and how bad or where in the scale they fall, if the whole life is taken into account is probably different than if you're just focused on four months of behavior.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Yeah. Last question. What's. What's on your bucket list? Like, you're a young kid. Do you want to get married? Do you want to have kids? Do you like what. What. What do you want out of life?

[Billy McFarland]

Yes. And. I think all the family stuff I keep private, but I think that's all super important and coming soon. I think in a lot of areas elsewhere, I think it's literally being able to just go up to every single person that I know I wronged, and maybe not someone who the world even knows was wronged or knows is a victim. Somebody like a Grant who you just mentioned, who wasn't a victim on paper. But I definitely hurt his growth and career as a person. Right. Like, people like that, I want to be able to make it up to in some capacity. So putting myself in a position where I can kind of give back to those I hurt, I think that's kind of a really cool, Cool motivation in

[Rachel Yukatel]

that line of questioning. The guy you were talking about a lot that came to you and said, you need to pay me back now or you're going to be on the COVID of the Wall Street Journal. Have you been able to apologize? Is your relationship repaired?

[Billy McFarland]

It's not. I think I've been a little petty there. I did apologize initially and rightfully so. Went unanswered. And then he asked me for something recently. I did not do it for him. So I think I'm being a little petty.

[Rachel Yukatel]

Got it. All right. Well, I gotta tell you, Billy, I do wish you the best of luck. I feel like you're a fascinating guy. You're clearly very smart, and I hope you've learned the lessons that you needed to. But I will say, going into this, I'm just someone like everyone else that has read about you, seen a lot about you, seen what happened, and it's hard not to obviously see that. You're a very intelligent person, but Sometimes people use that in the wrong ways. Sometimes people have very bad intentions. Maybe along the way you did or didn't. But I like you actually, now that I've spoken to you and I do wish you the best of luck and I really, I hope it works out for you and I hope you find happiness and success and completion in your life. I think you deserve it.

[Billy McFarland]

Thank you. Rachel.

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thank you so much for listening to Misunderstood. I'm your host, Rachel Yukatel. Please be sure to subscribe to the show and give us a five star rating and review. You can support the show by joining Our [e-mail] Misunderstood with Rachel Ukatel do you have ideas for the show or want to reach out? Email [e-mail] that's spelled M I S S. Understood. Thank you so much and I'll see you next time.

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