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By DCist Contributor Josh Solomon

DJ Whoo Kid put on his best Michael Buffer to turn up the Thursday night crowd in downtown D.C. The scene was not too different than a WWE rumble: women in tight clothing, bouncers twice the size of wrestlers, and a rambunctious crowd ready to see a spectacle.

“Are you ready for Waka?”

It’s right around midnight and a sold out crowd of around 500—comprised of mostly GW students, friends and brothers of its Sigma Chi fraternity chapter—are anxiously waiting for Waka Flocka to grace the stage.

But here he is, back upstairs along the side balcony private seating section, in nothing much of a hurry, taking one last long hit of a blunt from his pre-concert festivities. Back on April 20, in an interview with Rolling Stone, the Atlanta-based rapper announced his presidency—with his first goal to legalize marijuana—and said DJ Whoo Kid would be his vice president. Five months later, it isn’t easy to sit down for an interview with Mr. Flame.

The evening’s event is hosted by Tabelist, a promotion company that organizes events. Director of Events, Mike Margolis, said they put together the show for Cafe Asia. Then came the task to fill up the crowd: a member of GW’s Sigma Chi got in contact with Tabelist. They would end up essentially co-promoting the event, with the fraternity’s Facebook page saying over a thousand people planned on attending (although the capacity of the venue is a little under the 500 that got in).

Locking down an interview with Waka Flocka turned out to be a bit of a challenge. His people at Atlantic Records contacted DCist, and we set up a time to talk before the show around sound check. But when that didn’t quite come together, I was desperately trying to find another time to talk about his visit to D.C. and his supposed Presidential candidacy.

The crowd is packed and primarily white, but that’s nothing new to Waka Flocka. For a few years he worked closely with popular EDM artist Steve Aoki. He’s had one issue with a fraternity before, though—he cancelled an upcoming show at University of Oklahoma back in March because of racist slurs from the SAE frat. He had previously performed for them, much to his joy. But when the fraternity was caught with the racist remarks, Waka Flocka posted on his Instagram a reply.

“When I first started doing shows it was all hood spots and all black people,” he wrote. “Then I had some mainstream success and did some EDM and it was all shore people at my shows for a while. Now it’s white, black, and brown people at my shows. All races partying having a good time and enjoying themselves together peacefully. That’s what Waka Flocka is about. For that reason I must say I’m disgusted and disappointed in the actions of the SAE fraternity at University of Oklahoma and I will be canceling my scheduled performance for them next month. Racism is something I will not tolerate.”

This concert would remain peaceful and there were no reasons to draw any connections between GW’s Sigma Chi and Oklahoma’s SAE chapter.

At 11:20 p.m. security forced me to leave my post where I was taking photos: This section is now private. Waka Flocka’s crew shows up. Then Waka Flocka shows up—partying out where the audience can see him, before his own show. One bouncer is asking for $50 a head to get into the roped off area. At 11:30 p.m. Waka Flocka pops a bottle of champagne—an antic he will use often during his show—down onto the crowd from where he’s perched upon the balcony.

Margolis lets me in and the pursuit of an interview with Mr. Flame resumes. He’s preoccupied, taking selfies with anyone who asks, drinking and smoking anything in front of him. He realizes it’s time to perform, so the crowd disperses and he begins to head toward the stage—but he comes back up again for a quick smoke.

“We about to go crazy!” he screams to the crowd, acting as his own hype-man. The music switches to EDM; the crowd screams louder. In person, Waka Flocka Flame, 29, is physically imposing; he stands at a large 6-foot-3. “Waka Flocka for president!” DJ Whoo Kid announces, starting a chant from kids who go to one of the most politically active campuses in the country.

Waka Flocka responds to the chant in an All-American way: he holds up a fan’s iPhone and takes a selfie with the crowd.

Photo by the author

He then makes his way through the crowd, escorted by his bodyguard who wears a Waka Flocka For President shirt that says “Squad” and has a picture of the rapper’s face, characterized in Obama’s famous “Hope” poster.

Waka wears gray Yeezy’s, a t-shirt and three-quarter sweat pants, as his music plays on in the background. Inside the venue it feels exactly like an early D.C. September day—sweaty with an essence of cool. Everyone wants a photo with Waka Flocka, the people’s president for the night.

His big songs come and go, with female fans thrusted onto the stage, and by 1 a.m. the show is over. Waka Flocka comes upstairs and disappears for a moment. His manager, Quam, says he’s not in the right mindset for an interview now. The agreement is for the morning at Hotel Helix by Logan Circle, before they check out and hit the road. The lights go on but the party rages onward, with Waka Flocka quickly coming back out to join his crew.

Oldies play as employees sweep the main floor and Waka Flocka holds up in the air a party leftover. “Look, a shoe!” After the show, he’s surrounded almost exclusively by his friends, a blunt between his lips.

As I get ready to leave, Waka Flocka has a message for me and a couple others outside: “Where the fuck are you going? We’re going to Eden.” The club next door is near empty at just past 2 a.m. So this chapter lasts about 20 minutes. He’s excited to go to the club, but nearly everyone else who joins the hike up to the top floor are only there for him. A mixture of bachata, EDM, and hip-hop plays, with the rapper bouncing between friend groups, before he decides to end the evening’s events that seem almost too surreal to those following him around.

It’s 11:59 a.m. and there’s no sign of this presidential hopeful. Checkout is at noon. The hotel’s lobby is retro chic and at the moment, rather empty. A big, round clock has four numbers on it with a bold red frame. Next to it, an older lady mops the floor to the beat of light tunes coming from the quaint speaker system. One employee softly sings along, I want to be your lover.

The hotel receptionist, sporting a tightly tailored steel gray suit with a bright red pocket square, tells me they left already, although they didn’t officially check out. He didn’t see them leave and apparently the only other exit is through the garage, where the hotel’s offices are—only someone who excellently knows the place could find his way out of there. The hotel doesn’t seem to be the rapper’s type of place, but Waka Flocka defies convention, switching between hip-hop and EDM, between black and white, and everywhere in between almost effortlessly. He’s the most magnetic personality in a crowd—and it’s not just because he famous.

He smiles earnestly at everything and whips his long dreads all around a room. He’ll dive into a crowd to take selfies, but has a knack for eluding interviews. Perhaps the wild but wildly personable Waka Flocka is ready for the oval office with these escape tactics of his. Or maybe just the WWE.