AJ Maddah cuts ties with Big Day Out

After less than a year as promoter of Big Day Out, AJ Maddah has allegedly transferred his shares in the festival juggernaut over to Austin-based owners C3 Presents LLC.

Music Feeds broke the story, having obtained documents which outline Maddah’s pulling of his shares as of June 4 and cessation of his position as BDO Director.

Music Feeds have alleged Big Day Out’s Assistant Accountant Blake Kendrick is now Director of BDO Presents and its postal address is now that of a local law firm.

Maddah, who is still promoter of Soundwave festival, has confirmed in the past that the future of Big Day Out had been in doubt since he bought in, telling triple j’s Hack host its organisers “were on the edge of cancelling the event.”

Maddah came in as co-investor of Big Day Out last September taking the 49% share of previous promoter and co-Founder Ken West and, as is alleged in the documents obtained, the share of an unnamed company.

When co-Founder Viv Lees was interviewed by triple j last year, Lees cut no slack when asked for his opinion of Maddah’s buy-in: “I’m a little dismayed that AJ has come into the picture,” he asserted. “When I see the amount of work that has gone into building up the event over a 22 year period, and then to see [Maddah] come in to take it over really does alarm me. He plays fast and loose and he’s quite an odious character. This event has been so instrumental to the careers of many Australian artists, and AJ’s got no commitment to that.”

TMN have reached out to Big Day Out CEO Adam Zammit and will update this story as further information comes in. AJ Maddah is currently overseas.