Rolling Loud co-founders Tariq Cherif (L) and Matt Zingler (R) speak exclusively on why Orlando is the only U.S. version of the fest this year.
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Rolling Loud co-founder Tariq Cherif jokes about all the 2026 being 2016 memes. For Rolling Loud they are indeed going back in time in one respect by doing something they haven’t done since 2016.
For the first time in a decade, Cherif and business partner Matt Zingler will be holding only one festival in the U.S. May 8 – 10 of this year, the only Stateside version of Rolling Loud this year will be held in Orlando, Florida at Camping World Stadium.
That weekend, Don Tolliver, Playboy Carti and NBA Youngboy will lead a three-day lineup that includes Chief Keef, Destroy Lonely, Sexyy Red, OsamaSon, FakeMink and over 75 artists in total. In their only U.S. interview Zingler and Cherif spoke exclusively to me on why they shifted Rolling Loud to the sole U.S. appearance in 2026.
Steve Baltin: What are the advantages to doing one U.S. show versus a series as you have done in the past?
Matt Zingler: We used to do a lot of shows domestically. We’ve had New York, San Francisco, L.A. and there was a running joke where every weekend’s Rolling Loud. Being able to do something that is one location for the year, bringing everyone together, all the artists and fans in one location definitely goes back to where we started, which was one show in Miami. I definitely think for fans this will show them a great experience and people can travel all over the world because Orlando International Airport is convenient, the hotels are cheaper, that’s got the infrastructure to hold it. We chose this one location not just because it was Orlando and because it was in Florida but because of the convenience for fans and making it cost effective for fans to experience this. I definitely think it will be a great connector for our fans, and they’ll appreciate our art more as the artists that we are, which is creating a unique experience for fans.
Baltin: Lollapalooza obviously started out as a touring festival and morphed into a destination event. Are there single-city festivals, be it Lolla, ACL, whatever you particularly enjoyed?
Zingler: I’ve been to a lot of those destination festivals from Bonnaroo and EDC in Vegas, to Coachella. And I love really feeling the experience in the city, how it’s a city takeover, which is something we’re trying to accomplish here in Orlando, building out stuff to do during the week, the partnerships with Universal and showing our fans the experience. So, when you go to the city, you feel like everybody’s there for the same reason, for music, which is similar to when I’ve experienced camping festivals or destination festivals. It just makes you more in the spirit. It’s like going to the movie theater instead of watching in your house.
Baltin: And as you say, it also brings that spirit of people who are more inclined to meet each other because they’re traveling from all over.
Zingler: For sure, that’s critical. You can meet like-minded people — friends, new friends, significant others. It’s exciting.
Baltin: When was the last time that you did the one festival only in the U.S.?
Tariq Cherif: Oh, wow. The last time we only had one festival in the U.S. was 2016. That was our second year. By our third year, 2017, we really scaled up and the show went up to 40,000 people per day, 120,000 over the weekend. That same year, we expanded into a show in the Bay Area and a show in San Bernardino. Yeah, 2016 was the last time we had only one show. It’s interesting because right now there are a lot of memes about how 2026 feels like 2016 again. And here we are, 10 years later from 2016 doing something we did in 2016. So that meme might be true.
Baltin: Because it is the only one in the U.S., does it make it a little more special?
Cherif: Yeah, I think it’s an opportunity for us to hone in, focus, reclaim our magic, and just remind people how special we are. It’s not something you want to miss. And when there are multiple times throughout the year in the United States that you can go to a Rolling Loud, fans might feel like, “Oh, it’s okay that I miss this one. I’ll go to the next one.” When there’s only one, it’s like, “Dude, you can’t miss it. Because if you miss it, you got to wait a year for it.” That was definitely a big decision-making factor for us.
Baltin: How was the artist response to the one U.S. festival?
Zingler: I think for a while, the artists were so used to us booking them consistently that they were like, “Oh, yeah, we can’t do this one, we’ll do the next one.” So being able to have one event and us explaining that to them because a lot of people didn’t know that we were only doing one show even when we started booking it. Once the rumor got out everybody was like, “Well, we’ve got to be on this one. If we’re not on this one there’s not going to be another one and we don’t know if we’re going to be booked internationally.” So, the demand was definitely there for the talent to hit the stage because they know it was like our hip-hop Super Bowl. And I think that definitely had a lot of impact on the bookings and artists being interested in doing it because they couldn’t just do it later somewhere else.
Baltin: A lot of festivals made big changes during COVID because they had time to plan changes. When did these ideas begin for you?
Zingler: We’ve been having conversations for a while about where the brand should be. After COVID stir crazy is a phrase I would use. We were the first festival back in the U.S. that announced after COVID. What we felt during that time was we couldn’t wait to get back outside and our fans felt the same way because we do have a younger fan base. So, when we got back from COVID, we went pretty hard. And that year, we did do L.A., Miami. We had record-breaking sales for both those shows, which sold out instantly. Then, we’re not as old as Warped Tour, Coachella, EDC and other brands that have been around 20 years. So, we didn’t really need a facelift per se or a restructuring of our brand. And we didn’t really take the time during that COVID time to readjust the vision of the brand. We took it as an opportunity to conquer and to offer fans experiences and opportunities because we knew our friends would show up for us. Then as the time went forward and we looked at the landscape of music and just how times were changing, more recently did we decide the brand is a little bit saturated, which leads to our decision of doing one show because there is a heavy saturation in the market. Hip-hop music is on fire, but it’s just one of those things where there’s not as much dropping, consistency dropping, artists elevating. So, this was a unique time for us to really elevate talent and provide the headliner spots for talent that we may not have done before. Don Tolliver is a new headliner for us. NBA Youngboy is a new headliner for us domestically. It’s very exciting stuff.
Baltin: Where are the international destinations this year?
Cherif: We haven’t announced them yet, with the exception of India but it’s going to be a very exciting year. We’ve got a lot in the works. We did India in November and it was incredible; 65,000 fans, the culture shock but I’ll tell you what, the whole crowd loved hip-hop, loved Rolling Loud well
Baltin: It’s got to be a fun experience because it is fresh and you’re seeing it through different eyes for the first time?
Cherif: Absolutely, it’s a blessing, not just for us, but for anybody involved with the festival — the artists, us as the founders, the staff. The fact that music is the vehicle for which we’re traveling the world is a blessing and It’s really cool when you find yourself in these foreign countries for work, but you also get to just enjoy new cultures and new experiences. And it’s amazing.
Baltin: I’ve talked to so many artists about music being the universal language and the world just being as divided it is, going to these places where you’re seeing music bring people together has got to be a very gratifying thing as well.
Cherif: It reminds you that we all have more in common than we have differences. A music festival, such as Rolling Loud, is a really great reminder that when everybody is together, literally jumping for joy, having a great time, despite whatever differences we may have, we have more in common than our differences.
Baltin: Where is the dream place to take Rolling Loud?
Cherif: Tell them, Matt.
Zingler: I want to take it to space. I want to be the first music festival in space. I’d be okay with doing it on a spaceship, too. And then not doing a destination on a planet just yet, but I hope that we could get there one day, I’ve always thought how cool it would be just to be in space, and doing a music festival there is insane.