News flash: the music industry is still sexist. Case in point, Scotland’s biggest music festival TRNSMT, which recently announced next year's line-up. Out of 13 acts so far, there are only two women. Festival favourites Courteeners, Ian Brown, Liam Gallagher, Foals, Keane and Lewis Capaldi will be performing, alongside Rita Ora and Little Simz.
The defence? Not enough women ‘pick up guitars’, apparently. Or at least that’s according to festival director, Geoff Ellis, who believes more women need to be ‘playing in bands’.
‘We'd love there to be a higher representation of females but there isn't, certainly on the acts we're announcing today,’ he said. ‘It will be a while until there's a 50/50 balance. That's definitely several years ahead for any major festival to achieve because there's far, far less female artists. We need to get more females picking up guitars, forming bands, playing in bands.’
Okay, then. It’s not like Taylor Swift is being rumoured to headline Glastonbury{
That, and as BBC News notes, Primavera Sounds, in Barcelona, successfully had a 50/50 line-up this year, with artists like Lizzo, FKA Twigs, Janelle Monae, Christine and the Queens, Robyn and Sigrid playing. So it's far from impossible.
You probably won’t be surprised to hear that TRNSMT is the same festival which was widely mocked when it introduced the Queen Tut’s stage, a stage only for women, last year. But, good news: that will be returning this year! So it obviously doesn’t matter about the fact all of the headliners are men, the women who are playing get their own lady stage!
You will also not be surprised to hear TRNSMT was not one of the 45 festivals which signed a 2018 pledge to have 50/50 festivals by 2022.