Matt Healy of The 1975 has taken a swipe at triple j, after the radio station shared news of the band’s imminent Australian tour.
Taking to his Instagram stories last night (October 6), the band’s lead vocalist re-shared triple j’s announcement of The 1975’s ‘At Their Very Best Tour’, which is set to hit Australian shores in April of next year. In response, Healy accompanied his re-share with a scathing caption, writing: “Play our music then before you start licking our arse just cos you’ve finally realised we’re mint.”
Later, Healy doubled-down on his sentiments over on Twitter, again re-sharing triple j’s announcement with a more in-depth (yet equally expletive) assessment of the broadcaster’s reception to the band. “You literally have nothing to do with us coming to Australia [so] don’t start getting involved now,” Healy wrote, “You don’t have a monopoly on cool and the head of your company is a knobhead so yous can fuck off.”
https://twitter.com/MatthewTHealy/status/1577910779378122752
It’s worth noting that despite claiming the opposite, triple j has given The 1975 airplay since at least 2014. According to the Twitter account @triplejplays, the station has consistently played cuts from pop band’s five-album catalogue, including songs from their 2020 album Notes on a Conditional Form. The station had even played the band’s most recent 2022 single Happiness just hours before Healy aired his frustrations.
.@the1975 – Happiness (Dance Floor Edit) [09:24]
— triple j Plays (@triplejplays) October 5, 2022
It’s not the first time such criticisms have been levelled against triple j. In 2014, Fairfax Media published an investigation into whether the station was engendering sound bias by forcing musicians to alter their music to secure airplay. The investigation prompted responses from fellow radio stations and musicians alike, with Triple M commentator Mike Fitzpatrick echoing Healy’s sentiment: “We don’t care about ‘cool’ music or ‘on trend right now’ styles,” Fitzpatrick said, “if it’s a great song, we’ll play it.”
In the years since, Australian bands End of Fashion and Sticky Fingers, and singer-songwriter Whitley, have shared similar concerns around the perceived elitism of the station. Just last year, a slew of musicians called out what they deemed was the youth-based preference of triple j’s radio play, with the likes of Ainslie Wills and Jack Colwell both recounting their experience of remaining absent from the station once they’d reached their mid-20s.
As a female artist who stopped getting played on rotation when I hit my 30s, I finally feel seen 😉 https://t.co/fVuzkMzd7f
— Ainslie Wills (@ainsliewills) August 31, 2021
Thanks Triple J, the “Maybe your sound would be better suited to Double J” email was so great at 25. played once on the main station since then 😉 https://t.co/RICCBOyOkU
— Jack Colwell (@jackcolwell_) August 31, 2021
Healy’s comments come ahead of his band’s Australian tour, which is in support of their upcoming album, Being Funny in a Foreign Language. The 1975’s fifth studio LP will be released on October 14, and has been previewed by the singles Part of the Band, I’m in Love with You and All I Need to Hear.
