Rina Sawayama Called Out Matty Healy for His Racist Remarks

Rina Sawayama did not mince words during a performance over the weekend when she appeared to speak out against Matty Healy for his past racist comments. 

During her performance at Glastonbury Festival in the U.K. on Saturday night, Rina, 32, dedicated her song “STFU” to The 1975 frontman without ever mentioning his name, but instead referenced specific controversies surrounding Healy. 

“I wrote this next song because I was sick and tired of these microaggressions,” Rina said on stage to loud cheers. “So tonight, this goes out to a white man that watches ‘Ghetto Gaggers’ and mocks Asian people on a podcast. He also owns my masters. I’ve had enough!”

Rina is signed with Dirty Hit Records, the same label as The 1975, which is headed by the band's manager Jamie Oborne. Healy was the director of Dirty Hit from 2018 to 2023. 

Rina's powerful speech referred to several incidents surrounding Healy, including comments he made about rapper Ice Spice while on the podcast, The Adam Friedland Show. Healy called Ice Spice an “Inuit Spice Girl,” and a “chubby Chinese lady,” while mocking an Asian accent. Healy also spoke about watching a certain type of degrading pornography that shows women of color, particularly Black women, being brutalized. 

The episode has since been removed from both Apple Music and Spotify. Healy later apologized for his comments about Ice Spice on stage at a 1975 concert in New Zealand. 

“Ice Spice, I’m sorry. It’s not because I’m annoyed that me joking got misconstrued. It’s because I don’t want Ice Spice to think I’m a d**k," Healy said while laughing. "I love you, Ice Spice. I’m so sorry. I don’t want it to be misconstrued as mean.”

In an interview with The New Yorker in May, Healy addressed his several controversies, brushing them off by implying that most people aren't concerned with what he's said and done. 

“Nobody is sitting there at night slumped at their computer, and their boyfriend comes over and goes, ‘What’s wrong, darling?’ and they go, ‘It’s just this thing with Matty Healy.’ That doesn’t happen,” he said. “You’re either lying that you are hurt, or you’re a bit mental for being hurt. It’s just people going, ‘Oh, there’s a bad thing over there, let me get as close to it as possible so you can see how good I am.’”

Watch the clip of Rina's speech here: