The 1975 sued over singer Matty Healy’s on-stage gay kiss
August 7, 2024Organisers of the Malaysia-based Good Vibes Festival are suing the British rock band The 1975 and its members for violating prohibitions by sharing a same-sex kiss while performing in Kuala Lumpur last year.
The band, consisting of Matty Healy, Adam Hann, Ross MacDonald, and George Daniel, headlined the first day of the three-day festival in July 2023. During their set, Healy and MacDonald shared a kiss onstage to protest Malaysia’s anti-LGBTQ+ laws.
According to the LGBTQ+ advocacy organisation Outright International, same-sex relationships are illegal in Malaysia. Following the band's demonstration, the remainder of the festival was canceled.
According to ‘NBC News’, the festival is seeking approximately $2.4 million (approximately £1.9 million), claiming that the band breached its contract, causing financial loss to the festival’s organiser, Future Sound Asia.
Representatives for Future Sound Asia and The 1975 did not respond to requests for comment.
The lawsuit, filed in the U.K. High Court on July 23, alleges that the band was aware of the restrictions they needed to follow in order to perform. Organisers claim that the band planned to break the rules ahead of the festival. Restrictions included prohibitions on kissing, swearing, taking off clothes, drinking or smoking onstage, and discussing politics or religion, according to the lawsuit.
Image Credit: Canva
The lawsuit also notes that the band had been bound by the same restrictions when they performed at the festival in 2016. The agreement from 2016 stated that “flouting them will result in the event permit being revoked,” according to the lawsuit.
During the band’s 2023 set, Healy admitted to making a “mistake” by booking the festival and criticised Malaysia’s anti-LGBTQ+ policies while onstage. “I do not see the f------ point of inviting The 1975 to a country and then telling us who we can have sex with,” he said at the time.
Healy then kissed MacDonald. Shortly afterward, the band ended their set early, with Healy telling the crowd that they had “just got banned from Kuala Lumpur.”
This is not the first time Healy has protested a country's anti-LGBTQ+ laws during a performance. In 2019, he kissed a male fan onstage in Dubai, where homosexuality is illegal. He claimed the authorities were “going to arrest me” afterward, but the band managed to leave the country after the show, according to an interview with Healy from The Times of London.
Following the Good Vibes Festival incident, Malaysia’s minister of communications, Fahmi Fadzil, criticised The 1975 on X, calling their actions “very rude.”
“There is no compromise against any party that challenges, disparages and violates Malaysian laws,” he posted.
Fadzil subsequently announced the cancellation of the remainder of the 2023 festival after meeting with representatives of Future Sound Asia.
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Malaysia Cancels Music Festival After ‘The 1975’s’ Matty Healy Kisses Male Bandmate
Malaysia Government To Ban More LGBTQ+ Films
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