Promoter Wants Payment For Coolio No-Show

A Chilean promoter has accused Coolio and his manager of defrauding the company out of thousands of dollars.

Photo: AP Photo
Troops in Kosovo get in on the act during Coolio’s gig at Camp Bondsteel.

TGP Media claims Coolio’s former manager Blair “Goast” Bryson negotiated a four-date tour in South America with the company but then the rapper and his current manager Jarel Posey, who also plays saxophone for Coolio, cashed a deposit and never followed through with the deal.

In a statement to HipHopDX, TGP Media said the company “booked four shows through Blair Bryson originally in September…Three dates in Chile and another date in Buenos Aires, Argentina. If this would have happened, it would have been the first time Coolio’s ever presented himself in South America.

“We had to reschedule the dates from information we got from Blair that he had received from Coolio and his manager that Coolio had lost his temporary passport and he wasn’t gonna have it in time to travel,” the statement added. “So we switched the dates to November 6, 7, 8, and 9.”

But Coolio never showed and Bryson pointed the finger at Posey for the mishap.

“Jarel picked up the deposit payment from my office for Coolio, then tried to deny he had any involvement or knowledge of Coolio’s arrangement for this tour,” he told the website in an email. “That was thrown out of the window when my marketing director vouched [that] Jarel was in fact the one she gave the depsoit [sic] check to.”

Bryson added this is the third time this has happened with the rapper.

“I had a show I had to cancel and pay for lost flights as well as return money to our UK company in the UK, MN2S headed by Sharron over there. That was for a show scheduled in the Ukraine that had to be canceled and rescheduled twice, to actually never happening. He also took money for a show in [Monterrey] Mexico for October 31, and just left the promoter and myself hanging after receiving that deposit payment,” he wrote.

A legal rep for Coolio denied Bryson’s allegations and declined to comment. The rapper’s team reportedly contacted TGP Media following the incident to discuss rescheduling the dates, but the promoter told HipHopDX it no longer had any interest in working with the rapper.

“We want our money back,” TGP said.