KUALA LUMPUR: The organiser of Malaysia’s Good Vibes Festival has filed a lawsuit against British band The 1975 and all its members individually following frontman Matty Healy’s controversial incident on stage during the concert last year.
In an article by an international portal Variety on Tuesday (July 30) it was reported that festival organisers Future Sound Asia are seeking £1.9mil (RM11.25mil) after the band’s antics resulted in the festival being shut down.
It was reported that the organisers had said in documents filed at the United Kingdom's High Court that the band and their management team were aware of the numerous prohibitions the band had to abide by in order to perform.
At the concert on July 21 last year, Healy had slammed Malaysia’s LGBT laws and kissed his male bandmate Ross MacDonald onstage leading to the immediate cancellation of the Good Vibes Festival's final two days.
On this, Future Sound Asia had said the band previously performed at the festival in 2016 and were told of the prohibitions then and were reminded multiple times again ahead of the performance last July.
These prohibitions included swearing, smoking and drinking on stage, taking off clothes and talking about politics or religion.
Further guidelines issued by the Malaysia Central Agency for the Application for Foreign Filming and Performance by Foreign Artistes (Puspal) included a ban on “kissing, kissing a member of the audience or carrying out such actions among themselves.”
The band, who were paid $350,000 (RM1.6mil) to perform, agreed to abide by the rules in order to take part in the festival.
The lawsuit states that Puspal initially rejected the band’s application to perform last year due to a 2018 article about Healy’s drug addiction and subsequent recovery.
However, the application was granted after the band appealed, promising Healy would adhere to “all local guidelines and regulations".
The portal said the lawsuit claims that the night before the festival the band decided they “should not perform at the music festival” and discussed what action to take before changing their mind and agreeing to go ahead with the performance.
It added that the band then decided to play “a completely different setlist” in protest and and “act in way that were intended to breach the guidelines".
These acts included Healy making a “provocative speech” and taking part in a “long pretend passionate embrace” between Healy and bassist MacDonald “with the intention of causing offence and breaching the regulations and the terms of the agreement”.
"The band also planned to smuggle a bottle of wine onto the stage next to the main drum kit so Healy could have easy access," it said citing from the filed documents.
In the lawsuit, Healy is also accused of drinking alcohol, acting “in a drunken way,” smoking cigarettes “appearing to vomit on the stage and or grunt and spit excessively including towards the audience,” delivering a “profanity-laden speech” and deliberatively damaging a video drone hired by the festival organisers.
"Following the kiss PUSPAL officers ordered the band to stop their performance at which point Healy was “very aggressive” towards them, the lawsuit alleges, “swearing at them and others” to the point that he had to be restrained by his managers," the portal read.
It then said that the day after the performance, the organisers’ license was revoked and the remaining two days of the music festival which were set to include performances from both local and international bands such as The Strokes were canceled.
"Immediately after leaving the festival, the lawsuit states, the band and their management had “rushed to their hotels” to collect their luggage so they could leave the country the first thing the following morning as quickly as possible as they were aware the performance had breached Malaysian law.
It added that Healy has since claimed he was “briefly imprisoned” by Malaysian authorities following his on-stage protest and that the band have not yet filed a defence to the lawsuit.
In July last year (2023) Communications and Digital Minister Fahmi Fadzil ordered for the immediate cancellation of the Good Vibes Festival, following the controversial incident involving The 1975 during the concert that took place at the Sepang International Circuit.
Future Sound Asia then had to work out a refund mechanism, extending their apologies to ticket holders, vendors, sponsors, and partners.
