Lake Havasu politics ruined an Arizona spring break party

A DJ’s spring break set at a Lake Havasu City club was canceled after controversy spiked online over a song he made titled “F*CK ICE.” 

In mid-February, DJ CEO, whose real name is Jeremy Anderson, was booked by the waterfront music venue Kokomo Beach Club to play two sets over a weekend in early April. The Missouri-based DJ is from California but often travels between Los Angeles and Las Vegas for gigs and is signed to a Sacramento-based record label. 

Anderson’s DJing career began in Arizona. In the mid-2010s, he launched a record label, Worldwide Hip-Hop Productions, and performed gigs at venues across the West Valley, including frequent appearances at strip clubs. He also hosted a short-lived Arizona-based TV show called “News on the Streets,” which filmed at various events, including Scottsdale’s PornStar Ball, music release parties on Mill Avenue and Lake Havasu’s spring break.  

After that trip to Lake Havasu, it’d become a dream of Anderson’s to headline a spring break show there, which he calls “the real deal of spring break.” Hundreds of out-of-town college students flock to the city to party for their week off in the middle of the spring semester. In October, he reached out to the venue to book the weekend, and by February, he was booked as the man behind the turntables, playing top 40 hits for drunk college kids. 

His flight was booked, flyers were created and his contract was sent to London Bridge Resort, the hotel where Kokomo is housed. Anderson assumed “everything’s all good” but before the contract came back to him, his flyers began swirling on social media, specifically within groups of Republicans in Lake Havasu City. 

Users had sniffed out a song Anderson had produced nearly three months prior, called “F*CK ICE,” in reaction to the Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s activity nationwide. 

“I normally don’t get political, but that is something I do kind of hold dearly to me,” Anderson tells Phoenix New Times. “I grew up in an all-Hispanic neighborhood, I’ve been around Mexican culture for a long time and I stand with my Latino-Hispanic fanbase.”

But Anderson’s song didn’t sit well with residents of the MAGA stronghold on social media. Accounts and groups such as @Havasufortrump45 and the Lake Havasu Republicans Facebook group called on the act to be canceled, writing, “This is not ok in our community.” Social media users also quickly turned their anger toward London Bridge Resort General Manager Cal Sheehy, who is also the Republican mayor of Lake Havasu. 

“Oh and by the way, the general manager of Kokomo’s is no other than the current Mayor of Lake Havasu, Cal Sheehy, himself,” the Facebook post from @Havasufortrump45, who has been supporting Sheehy’s primary opponent on social media, read. “And he is running for re-election right now. Is that who you want leading our community?” 

Shortly after the online outrage began, Kokomo canceled Anderson’s set, which he believes was done for political reasons to avoid hurting Sheehy’s reelection campaign. In a call with New Times, Sheehy denied the decision was reelection-motivated. 

Rather, Sheehy says the decision was made by the London Bridge Resort team after they were informed of the song because “we’re not in the business to be politically motivated on any level, and so we determined that that was not going to be in the best interest and decided not to move forward with the show. It created a lot of angst and that’s not the business we’re in.” 

After Anderson’s set was canceled, the two spoke over the phone, but they have different accounts of who initiated the call and how it went. Anderson claims Sheehy wanted to speak with him and started “over-talking me, basically putting me down, saying I was wrong to bring controversy to his venue.”

Sheehy views it differently. Instead, he says Anderson wanted to talk and began the conversation “immediately aggressive.” The conversation ended up being quite brief. 

After his set was canceled, Anderson felt screwed over, not only for the loss of $300 nonrefundable plane tickets, but also for his fans who’d already bought tickets. 

“I don’t feel like they should be subjecting book talent to the politics of their elections,” Anderson says. “As performers, we’re not sitting there looking at the politics of each place that we booked and seeing, ‘OK, how can I make the mayor look good in this place?’ Like, we have no clue.”