British band The 1975 claim they were ‘briefly imprisoned’ after kiss at KL music festival
FORT WORTH, Texas – British pop-rock band The 1975 were “briefly imprisoned” in Malaysia, after its frontman Matty Healy criticised the country’s anti-LGBTQ laws and kissed a bandmate onstage at a music festival in Kuala Lumpur.
Healy made this claim during a 10-minute speech at the band’s performance in Fort Worth, Texas, on Tuesday night. A video of the speech was posted on the band’s X (formerly Twitter) account.
In July, Malaysian authorities cancelled a three-day Good Vibes Festival (GVF) featuring the band and other performers, after Healy criticised the government for criminalising same-sex relationships.
After his criticisms, Healy and bassist Ross MacDonald kissed onstage. The 1975 were banned from performing in Malaysia and the band cancelled subsequent concerts in Taiwan and Indonesia.
In his speech in Fort Worth, Healy addressed the “liberal outrage” against its band. He said that many people who “appear to be liberal people contended that the performance was an insensitive display of hostility against the cultural customs of the Malaysian government, and that the kiss was a performative gesture of allyship”.
To call the band’s performance colonialism “is a complete inversion of the word’s meaning, he said. “We have no (power) at all to enforce will on anyone in Malaysia. In fact, it was the Malaysian authorities who briefly imprisoned us”.
He told his fans in Texas that they had “drawn the short straw”.
“You’ve gotten the show where I’ve genuinely stopped caring... I don’t mind hollow shallow accusations of being racist or stuff like that, it kind of allows the show to do what it’s designed to do – expose inconsistencies and hypocrisies, I use myself to do that,” he said.
“The 1975 did not waltz in Malaysia unannounced... (We) were invited to headline a festival by a government who had full knowledge of the band with its well publicised political views and its routine stage show,” he said.
“Malaysian festival organisers’ familiarity with the band was the basis of our invitation.”
Healy said the kiss was “not a stunt simply meant to provoke the government”.
“It was an ongoing part of The 1975 stage show, which has been performed many times prior. Similarly, we chose to not change our set that night to play pro-freedom of speech, pro-gay songs,” he said.
“To eliminate any routine part of the show in an effort to appease the Malaysian authorities’ bigoted views of LGBTQ people would be a passive endorsement of those politics.”
Homosexuality is forbidden in Malaysia, and laws criminalising sodomy can result in imprisonment or corporal punishment.
In July, Malaysia’s Communications Minister Fahmi Fadzil said he ordered the immediate cancellation of the rest of the festival, with organisers asked to compensate those who had bought tickets.
“I want to stress, the position of the unity government is very clear. There is no compromise against any party that challenges, disparages and violates Malaysian laws,” he said in a post on X.
In August, Healy said during the band’s gig in Hawaii that he feared jail time in Malaysia, referring to the controversy.
In Fort Worth on Tuesday, Healy said it “should be expected” that if organisers “invite dozens of Western performers into your country, they’ll bring their Western values with them”.
“If the very same things which made you aware of them could land them in jail in your country, you’re not actually inviting them to perform. You’re indirectly commanding them to reflect your country’s policies by omission,” he added.
In September, Healy clarified that the band are not going for an “indefinite hiatus” when they complete their latest tour.
Earlier that month, he had said that the band would go on an “indefinite hiatus” after their “Still...At Their Very Best” world tour wraps up in March 2024 in Amsterdam.
The band are being sued by Future Sound Asia (FSA), the organiser of GVF, which is demanding them to pay more than £2 million (S$3.6 million) in damages after the music festival was cancelled abruptly, following the controversial gig.
In July, the band held two sold-out concerts in Singapore at the Sands Expo & Convention Centre, having previously played here in 2014, 2016 and 2019.
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