Things that piss you off that shouldn't

[Davkaus]

7 minutes ago, Genie said:

That was my take on it too. Not sure he always looks to make things about race. His entire standup routine for how many years was always about being black. 

I think there's two points there. His comedy sets are shit, much the same as Sarah Milican whose entire act is about being a grumpy older woman, or Tom Allen who leans on being gay for all of his jokes. Banging on about the same thing in your comedy sets makes for a pretty dull performance, you need a bit of variety.

It's a very different thing, IMO, to tell someone they "make things about race" too much when they're advocating and campaigning for better inclusivity, away from their entertainment work. With all due respect, if there's any group that's entitled to tell people when it's time to stop going on about diversity and inclusivity, it's not a football forum comprising of 99% straight, white, able-bodied men.

[Genie]

7 minutes ago, Davkaus said:

I think there's two points there. His comedy sets are shit, much the same as Sarah Milican whose entire act is about being a grumpy older woman, or Tom Allen who leans on being gay for all of his jokes. Banging on about the same thing in your comedy sets makes for a pretty dull performance, you need a bit of variety.

It's a very different thing, IMO, to tell someone they "make things about race" too much when they're advocating and campaigning for better inclusivity, away from their entertainment work. With all due respect, if there's any group that's entitled to tell people when it's time to stop going on about diversity and inclusivity, it's not a football forum comprising of 99% straight, white, able-bodied men.

I’m all for relevant observations from him or anyone else about lack of diversity, but complaining there’s too many white faces in the crowd at Glastonbury didn’t feel like one to me. When he swings and misses like this it waters down his opinion on what could be valid points.

How many other people look at a crowd of people enjoying a concert and see skin colour? I see people having a good time.

Also, I don’t think anybody suggested it’s time to stop going on about diversity.

Edited June 15, 2022 by Genie

[Davkaus]

Just now, Genie said:

I’m all for relevant observations from him or anyone else about lack of diversity, but complaining there’s too many white faces in the crowd at Glastonbury didn’t feel like one to me. When he swings and misses like this it waters down his opinion on what could be valid points.

It might not be a particularly compelling argument, I haven't watched the documentary yet, I probably will just because as I said, it was something that jumped out to me too.

I think it's something worth talking about though - I certainly don't think it's a problem if every single crowd at a major event isn't perfectly drawn down racial lines. I don't think it's some critical problem we need to solve at all costs, but when there are these kind of discrepancies, I think it's interesting to look at why. Is it just the lack of black people on stage, is it some other cultural difference about less interest in festivals/camping in general among black people, or is it that it's such a predominantly white crowd, other groups feel less welcome and a bit more could be done to make it a more welcoming environment? Could it just be socioeconomic demographics rather than race, as it's quite an expensive event?

I don't think it's a problem that x% of the crowd aren't black, or gay, or asian, or anything else, as long as it's just because "we don't want to see that shit" rather than a feeling of "are we welcome there?"

[bickster]

20 minutes ago, Davkaus said:

One of the things he brings up is that Stormzy is the first ever black person to headline at Glasto, what, 50 years in.

He's wrong. Gilberto Gil played the second ever festival in 1971, Taj Mahal in 1981 

The 1983 line up had The Beat followed by Aswad followed by UB40 as the Top 3 on the Saturday and Fun Boy 3 followed by Curtis Mayfield followed by King Sunny Ade on the Sunday

I gave up at this point

[Davkaus]

1 minute ago, bickster said:

He's wrong. Gilberto Gil played the second ever festival in 1971, Taj Mahal in 1981 

The 1983 line up had The Beat followed by Aswad followed by UB40 as the Top 3 on the Saturday and Fun Boy 3 followed by Curtis Mayfield followed by King Sunny Ade on the Sunday

I gave up at this point

I've misquoted him there - double checked after your post and it was actually "first black *british* *solo performer* who headlined", which feels like a fairly selective set of criteria to identify a problem where perhaps there isn't one.

[bickster]

3 minutes ago, Davkaus said:

I've misquoted him there - double checked after your post and it was actually "first black *british* *solo performer* who headlined", which feels like a fairly selective set of criteria to identify a problem where perhaps there isn't one.

So it's still bollocks then

Without consulting anything, Shirley Bassey

[tonyh29]

41 minutes ago, Davkaus said:

Very much could be. Why is that though? One of the things he brings up is that Stormzy is the first ever black person to headline at Glasto, what, 50 years in.

It's a very different crowd, but I went to Download at the weekend. My other half pointed out on the Friday "it's a very white crowd isn't it", and we started keeping count, not including staff, we saw about 10 black/asian people over the next 3 days. Is that because of racism? Probably not, but Lenny Henry doesn't say it is, his documentary is about black representation in culture, and encouraging inclusivity, he's not saying the Glasto organisers or its crowd is racist, just asking the question as to why music festivals seem to be so white dominated.

He's a shit comic, for what it's worth, I just think it's a bit depressing that any time someone talks about race issues, even when they're doing it in a non-accusatory way, some old white blokes are always keen to tell the uppity black people to shut up and get on with their job.

Yeah the stormzy thing  is a valid point , but from a perspective of ignorance , i thought Glastonbury was a kinda rock festival and Stormzy is a rap artist ?  so would it  be like saying how come no white rock bands have headlined at a rap music festival  in 50 years ( is there even such a  thing ?)  i think Glastonbury has diversified it music style in the past few years to include other genres , but one of the muso's can give more history on that and why its taken 50 years 

I was at the isle of Wight festival last year , must admit I wasn't really thinking about it , but yeah that was also a very white crowd .. I suppose it has to be more than just the genre and some other factor , or just simple %'s  (only  3% of the population are black ?) 

 

As @mjmooney said (paraphrasing)  in a thread the other month  , it will be great when we just see people rather than a colour , I don't know if Henrys comments will help or hinder this 

 

Edit - just read the subsequent posts by @bickster on this , so that question has been answered 

Edited June 15, 2022 by tonyh29

[sharkyvilla]

I've always thought of Glasto (and most other festivals) as an indie/rock n roll festival and there haven't been many black British acts who have got to headliner-level in that genre.  Now they could get more diverse types of acts from more genres like they did with Stormzy but it might put off the core audience who don't like rap.  It's a business at the end of the day.

Edit yeah basically what @tonyh29 said

Edited June 15, 2022 by sharkyvilla

[Chindie]

I believe the Glastonbury 'headliner' slot is usually considered the 3 main stage stage closing each night of the festival. In which case the likes of Bassey wouldn't count - she did what has become known as the 'legends' slot iirc, the afternoon Sunday slot.

[Chindie]

On Glastonbury and it being a white crowd. It's hard to overlook that it's now famously a very middle class event and tickets are expensive. The UK population of black people is pretty low and I would not be surprised if the majority of those people don't fall into the demographics that can afford to drop £300 on a ticket to spend a weekend in a tent.

[Paddywhack]

Can we get back to the big topics please..?

1 hour ago, Paddywhack said:

My son woke me up this morning by putting his bogey in my mouth.

 

[blandy]

On 13/06/2022 at 19:58, foreveryoung said:

We confirmed the driver so we have now recieved a further letter to take 3 points and £100 fine or a driving course, which has to be paid for ofcourse. But she still has no idea what she has done.

Now you've confirmed the driver, you should be able to get the evidence for the charge - ask for it.

[Seat68]

There may be some (politely put) ignorance being demonstrated here. The pyramid stage at Glastonbury isn't the only stage. It's the one that gets the most TV time but there are a ridiculous amount of other stages (one is actually called the other stage) that have a very diverse line up. Even so the line up has the likes of Kendrick Lamar, Little Simz, Megan Thee Stallion, Yola, Carl Cox all headlining, and that is just a very small sample. 

[mjmooney]

11 minutes ago, Chindie said:

I believe the Glastonbury 'headliner' slot is usually considered the 3 main stage stage closing each night of the festival. In which case the likes of Bassey wouldn't count - she did what has become known as the 'legends' slot iirc, the afternoon Sunday slot.

Not to mention the fact that Shirl hardly performed what most people would think of as 'black music'. 

[Seat68]

I have mentioned previously a reggae festival that's happening in Vegas. A 3 day reggae festival. Remove Steel Pulse from the lineup and there are 4 black people on the bill. 4, and that's a reggae festival. 

[blandy]

21 minutes ago, sharkyvilla said:

I've always thought of Glasto (and most other festivals) as an indie/rock n roll festival and there haven't been many black British acts who have got to headliner-level in that genre.  Now they could get more diverse types of acts from more genres like they did with Stormzy but it might put off the core audience who don't like rap.  It's a business at the end of the day.

It's not really run as a business - all the proceeds go to charity/causes.

Also, it used to be, you're right, very indie/rock slanted and also very male oriented in terms of artists, but in recent years it's diversified significantly to have much greater non-white and non-male and non-rock/indie artists in the line ups - hence Beyonce, Stormzy, Florence Welsh, Kylie and so many more, and then there are the electronic and dance acts and so on. And as people don't know who is in the line up when they book tickets it hasn't affected the popularity of it at all.

About 2% of the population is black, I think, so unless it was to be over-represented in the crowd, you'd maybe not expect to see huge numbers of black people there - I guess Asian people make up more of the population of the UK, but maybe culturally there's a liking for more "non-western" artists and perhaps there should/could be more wider international acts as a consequence/draw for them?

But I suppose ultimately it's a UK festival that pretty much reflects UK popular music tastes and is attended by people wealthy enough to go to that kind of event

[villa4europe]

glastonbury does its best IMO

other festivals go down the route of specific genres and its not necessarily the organisers who plays and listens to that genre of music (i would excuse download for example)

Henry should be looking elsewhere like what is the biggest hip hop / grime / rnb festival and is that struggling to get the media coverage that transmit, glasto and reading gets? he should go deep in to the music and look at why hip hop artists don't automatically translate particularly well to stadium tours and huge crowds which is something for the industry to discuss because it is near fact, what is stormzy doing that means he can sell out wembley but say dizee rascal or skepta or kano or dave cant do that show - it is an interesting question, anyone who listens to the hip hop saved my life podcast where they're all huge fans of hip hop often talk about how bad live hip hop shows can be

is there even a 100k person hip hop / rnb festival in the states?

[Seat68]

28 minutes ago, villa4europe said:

glastonbury does its best IMO

other festivals go down the route of specific genres and its not necessarily the organisers who plays and listens to that genre of music (i would excuse download for example)

Henry should be looking elsewhere like what is the biggest hip hop / grime / rnb festival and is that struggling to get the media coverage that transmit, glasto and reading gets? he should go deep in to the music and look at why hip hop artists don't automatically translate particularly well to stadium tours and huge crowds which is something for the industry to discuss because it is near fact, what is stormzy doing that means he can sell out wembley but say dizee rascal or skepta or kano or dave cant do that show - it is an interesting question, anyone who listens to the hip hop saved my life podcast where they're all huge fans of hip hop often talk about how bad live hip hop shows can be

is there even a 100k person hip hop / rnb festival in the states?

Rolling Loud comes closest but nowhere near the size of Glastonbury. 

[rjw63]

1 hour ago, tonyh29 said:

I think it was intended more as a comment that Henry isn't funny rather than a "how dare he  have an opinion " comment 

all subjective of course  , when he first broke on the scene some of his material was pretty good , but he's been about as funny as Mrs Brown's boys for some time now 

[bickster]

1 hour ago, Chindie said:

I believe the Glastonbury 'headliner' slot is usually considered the 3 main stage stage closing each night of the festival. In which case the likes of Bassey wouldn't count - she did what has become known as the 'legends' slot iirc, the afternoon Sunday slot.

Dizzee Rascal then

I think when you look at those last three on the Pyramid Stage, there's not a lot of Solo performers in those slots, of those that are, less than half of them are British. George Ezra, Paul Weller and Adele maybe a few more