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Artist News Awards Gigs & Festivals
Sigrid and a load of blokes announced for BRITs Week
By Andy Malt | Published on Wednesday 15 January 2020
The BRIT Awards has announced its annual BRITs Week run of live shows around London in the run-up to the big ceremony, staged in aid of War Child. As ever, tickets will only be available through a prize draw, with each entry costing a £5 donation to the charity.
Last year this raised over half a million pounds. So, this is definitely a good and worthy thing. And a positive story for the BRITs in a week when it’s faced heavy criticism for a distinct lack of women in its award nominations.
Seemingly foreseeing that disparagement, organisers caveated the nominations announcement by pointing out that eligibility for a BRIT award is based in part on chart success. The implication being that it’s the fault of music consumers that more women aren’t up for awards. They haven’t found a similar defence for only managing to include one woman in the twelve acts announced for BRITs Week.
Those acts are: Bastille, Catfish And The Bottlemen, Bombay Bicycle Club, Sigrid (a woman), Yungblud, Tom Walker, Louis Tomlinson, Jack Savoretti, Gang Of Youths, Tom Grennan, Nothing But Thieves and Declan McKenna.
“Looking back at some of the amazing acts that have performed in BRITs Week to raise money for War Child – including Coldplay, Florence And The Machine, Ed Sheeran, Jess Glynne, The 1975, Elbow, Mabel and Mahalia – you realise what an important celebration of the UK’s diverse music talent it has become”, says BRITs chief exec Geoff Taylor, diverting attention from the distinct lack of diversity in this year’s line-up with a more diverse list of acts not performing this year.
“It is a fundamental element of the build up to the BRIT Awards”, he goes on. “And with our partners AEG, O2 and War Child we are THRILLED to announce the 2020 edition of BRITs Week, which also marks the 40th BRIT Awards show”.
None of which is likely to stop this line-up escalating criticism of the general lack of diversity in BRITs-ville this year. But these shows, let’s remember, are for charity. You can enter the prize draw to win tickets to see the gig of your choice here. You have until 3 Feb.
Here are the dates and venues:
8 Feb: Catfish And The Bottlemen, Exhibition London
10 Feb: Yungblud, Camden Assembly
11 Feb: Jack Savoretti, Omeara
12 Feb: Declan McKenna, Islington Assembly Hall
13 Feb: Louis Tomlinson, Scala
14 Feb: Tom Walker, Omeara
16 Feb: Sigrid, Omeara
16 Feb: Bombay Bicycle Club, Bush Hall
17 Feb: Gang Of Youths, Omeara
19 Feb: Tom Grennan, Bush Hall
21 Feb: Nothing But Thieves, The Dome
22 Feb: Bastille, London Palladium
