BRIT Awards host Mo Gilligan has said he sees where Sam Smith is “coming from”, after the singer expressed frustration over the event announcing an all-male best artist category.
The annual ceremony scrapped its male and female categories in 2021, but was slammed this year after it emerged that one of its biggest categories, artist of the year, featured no women – despite an uptick in female artists or all-women groups across the board.
Following the announcement, Sam, 30, who is non-binary and spoke out in favour of genderless categories before the change, said the 'snub' just shows there is “still a long way to go”.
Mo, 34, who is hosting the event for a second year, said “I see where Sam’s coming from.
“People always want to be represented in music, whatever faith they’re from or gender they are.
“But it’s really about me hosting it rather than my opinions. If I got into opinions on music, it’d be so vast."
Speaking to The Times, he said: “It’s really good that people are using their platform to speak up about it.
“Some people might not want to do that because it might affect them winning.”
Responding to the issue that Sam had previously been unable to compete in either the male or female categories, he added: “Yeah. What I do like is that music always sparks these good conversations.”
Harry Styles, rapper Central Cee, DJ Fred again, pop singers George Ezra and and Stormzy are all in with a chance of adding the Artist of the Year gong to their trophy cabinet.
Just 17.6% of artists originally shortlisted last year for the award were women, and included Mabel, Florence and the Machine, Charli XCX, Becky Hill and Rina Sawayama - but none of the female stars made the cut when the final nominations were announced on in January.
Amid fury over the snubs, The BRIT Awards issued a statement, explaining there were "fewer higher profile" female artists in 2022.
A spokesperson for the academy said: "While it’s disappointing there are no nominations in the Artist of the Year category, we also have to recognise that 2022 saw fewer high profile women artists in cycle with major releases as was the case in 2021.
"Last year’s introduction of new categories aimed at making the awards even more inclusive, recognising exceptional work rather than how artists identify."
The artist of the year gong, introduced last year, combined the previous categories for British female solo artist and British male solo artist.
It was a result of the academy's wish to eliminate the distinctions between male and female artists and replace it with new gender neutral honour. Adele was the inaugural winner.
Harry Styles and Wet Leg lead the nominations at this year’s BRITs, with four nominations each.
Stormzy follows with three nods for album of the year, artist of the year and hip hop grime rap act.
The BRIT Awards 2023 will take place on Saturday, February 11, and will be broadcast live on ITV1 and ITVX from The O2 arena in London.
