The 1975’s Matty Healy defends controversial Malaysia festival kiss in 10-minute phone statement

The rock band’s frontman insisted the embrace had not been political and was a ‘performative gesture of allyship’
Tina Campbell11 October 2023
The Weekender

Sign up to our free weekly newsletter for exclusive competitions, offers and theatre ticket deals

I would like to be emailed about offers, event and updates from Evening Standard. Read our privacy notice.

Matty Healy has addressed the controversy he caused after kissing his male bandmate on stage in Malaysia where homosexual acts are illegal and punishable by law.

The 1975 frontman addressed the audience at the band’s show in Dallas on Monday and explained that he had been told not to speak about Malaysia but he was “p***ed off” as he read out a 10-minute-long statement from his phone.

“Unfortunately, there’s so many incredibly stupid people on the internet that I’ve just cracked. And everyone keeps telling me that you can’t talk about Malaysia, don’t talk about what happened in Malaysia, so I’m gonna talk about it at length … I am p***ed off, to be frank,” the son of former Loose Women star Denise Welch began.

He argued that 1975 didn’t “waltz into Malaysia” but were booked by festival organisers who were well aware of the band’s political views and stage show. He added that kissing his bandmate, Ross McDonald, “was not a stunt simply meant to provoke the government” but an “ongoing part of The 1975 stage show which had been performed many times prior”.

Had the band omitted any “routine part” of the show to “appease the Malaysian authorities’ bigoted views of LGBTQ people” that would’ve been “a passive endorsement of those politics”, Healy said.

Matty Healy said he was ‘puzzled’ by the response
Getty Images

“As liberals are so fond of saying, ‘silence causes violence, use your platform’ – so we did that. And that is where things got complicated,” he added.

On July 22, the Brit rock band performed on the first day of Good Vibes Festival in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Their performance was cut short however when Healy kissed bassist MacDonald while criticising the country’s anti-LGBT+ laws under which homosexual acts were illegal.

The festival was called off after the first of three planned days, with Malaysia’s government calling the band “extremely rude”. At the time, it was reported that the group will not be permitted to perform in the country again.

At the Dallas gig, Healy said he thought it was “puzzling” that “lots of people, 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”.

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Create Account you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy policy .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in