Fat White Family playing the NME Awards Tour in Leeds (Photo: Gary Mather for Live4ever)
Fat White Family have questioned Slaves‘ right to a government music grant due to their status as a major label-signed band.
Writing on Facebook, they labelled Isaac Holman and Laurie Vincent‘s inclusion on the BPI’s Music Exports Growth Scheme as ‘shameful’. “Why does a band that has been on a major label (virgin/EMI) for three years need a grant explicitly designed to support artists trying to break through on independent labels?,” they asked.
“Say what you like about the ‘artist’ in question, but to me this reeks of back room agreements and golden hand shakes. Everybody knows the music industry is a cess pool, but anyone remotely involved in music should be up in arms about this; how many people that genuinely NEED that money are getting shat on so a bunch of faceless suits can keep their gravy train rolling?”
“So Slaves, a band that probably takes about 10-20K a pop on the festival circuit can go and do SXSW?”
Slaves aren’t rising to the bait, and have sent out their own message of love on social media.
@FatWhiteFamily love you boys, never stop being you ✌?
— Slaves (@Slaves) January 11, 2017