Vanilla Ice Plans to Play a Concert in Austin to Potentially Thousands of People Due to Shutdown Loophole

Vanilla Ice will be playing a concert in Austin, Texas on Friday following a loophole in venue shutdowns. While bars and music venues are closing their doors following an executive order from Texas Governor Greg Abbott due to spikes in COVID cases, restaurants are able to remain open. Vanilla Ice, whose performance is scheduled to take place at Emerald Point Bar & Grill, is able to continue due to the venue technically being a restaurant.

The venue, which can hold up to 5,000 people, will be set at half capacity for this weekend, with only 2,500 tickets available in order to remain within social distancing guidelines. COVID-19 cases have surged in recent weeks as the state began to open up, with reported 4,283 cases throughout Texas on June 29 jumping to 6,975 cases on June 30. Austin has had a confirmed total of 10,124 cases and 128 deaths.

According to the Austin Chronicle, the concert is allowed to happen because 51 percent of the venues’ sales are food. Several other Austin venues have managed to remain open due to the same loophole.

Vanilla Ice commented on Instagram earlier this week about his excitement to get back to performing with a video showing a packed crowd.

“I can’t wait to get back to this,” Vanilla Ice said in an Instagram post. “The 90s were the best. We didn’t have coronavirus, or cell phones, or computers. We had 5.0’s, Blockbuster, Beavis and Butthead, Wayne’s World, Chris Tucker and Jackie Chan.”

Tickets for the concert range from $20 to $300 as a VIP, with VIP tickets currently sold out. According to The Texas Tribune, only 84 tickets have been sold as of Wednesday night.

Another ‘90s act, Color Me Badd, will also be performing at the venue on July 4. Texas music festival Austin City Limits announced it will be postponing until 2021 today, with the festival originally supposed to occur October 2 to 4, then the following weekend on October 9 to 11.

UPDATE (7/2): Vanilla Ice has cancelled his planned performance in Austin. He stated in a video posted to Twitter that the cause of the cancellation is rising COVID-19 numbers. Texas, along with several other states including California and Florida, posted a record number of positive cases today according to CNN.