Rina Sawayama announces 2023 Japan tour

The tour supports the singer’s new sophomore album ‘Hold The Girl’

Rina Sawayama

Japanese-British singer-songwriter Rina Sawayama has announced a three-date Japan tour in 2023, featuring stops in Nagoya, Osaka and Japan.

  • READ MORE: Otoboke Beaver: “I think it’s wonderful that there’s no other band that sounds like us”

The alt-pop starling’s Japan outing supports the release of her sophomore album ‘Hold The Girl’ , out today (September 16). The tour will begin in Nagoya, where she will play at Diamond Hall on January 17. The tour continues in Osaka, where she will perform at Zepp Osaka Bayside on January 18, before concluding in Tokyo on January 20 at the Tokyo Garden Theater.

View this post on Instagram A post shared by Rina Sawayama (@rinasonline)

Standing tickets for the Nagoya and Osaka dates will cost JPY8,500. “2F reserved seats” will also be made available at the Osaka date for JPY9,000. For the Tokyo show, “S” seats will sell for JPY9,500, whereas “A” seats – situated behind the third balcony on the fifth floor of the venue – will cost JPY8,500.

The general release for tickets of all dates will be made available on November 5, at 10AM Japan time, though members of various ticketing agencies will be entitled to earlier access to tickets – for instance, members of Live Nation Japan Premium Club and Creative Man will be able to purchase tickets starting today at 6PM Japan time. More ticketing details can be found on Live Nation’s official event pages for the respective dates.

The fresh string of Japan dates follows the singer’s recent announcement of 2023 dates in Australia and New Zealand , which will see her stopping for performances in Auckland, New Zealand, and Sydney, Melbourne, and Brisbane in Australia.

Since May, Rina Sawayama has been consistently previewing ‘Hold The Girl’ with five singles: ‘This Hell’ , ‘Catch Me In The Air’ , ‘Hold The Girl’ , ‘Phantom’ and ‘Hurricanes’ . In a recent interview, the singer acknowledged the similarities between ‘This Hell’ and the 1979 ABBA smash, ‘Gimme! Gimme! Gimme! (A Man After Midnight)’, an issue which was resolved through Elton John’s mediation by linking up the two parties. ABBA keyboardist Benny Andersson eventually gave Sawayama the permission to maintain ‘This Hell’s’ current form.

She will begin touring ‘Hold The Girl’ in October with a slew of dates in the UK and Ireland , which will then be followed by a North American tour in November.

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rina sawayama japan tour

RINA SAWAYAMA

世界を虜にする新時代のポップ・アイコン、リナ・サワヤマの初となるジャパンツアーが開催決定!

INFORMATION

明日からスタートとなるリナ・サワヤマ初のジャパン・ツアー。 名古屋公演、大阪公演ともに18時より各会場当日券売り場にて販売いたします。 1/17(火) 名古屋ダイアモンドホール オールスタンディング¥9,000(税込・ドリンク代別) 1/18(水) Zepp Bayside Osaka 1Fスタンディング¥9,000(税込・ドリンク代別)

リナ・サワヤマのツアー会場で販売されるツアー・グッズのラインナップが公開! また各会場、開場時間に先駆けて下記の時間にて先行販売を行う予定です! 1/17(火) 名古屋公演 16:30 - 17:30 1/18(水) 大阪公演 16:30 - 17:30 1/20(金) 東京公演 16:00 - 17:30 ※当日の天候状況等により、販売時間が急遽変更になる場合がございます。 ※支払いは現金のみの取り扱いとなります。 ※デザイン、販売価格が変更になる場合がございます。 ※実際の商品と、色味やデザイン等に誤差がある場合がございます。 ※ご購入後、不良品以外の返品・交換は一切致しませんので、サイズ・色等をご確認の上お買い求めください。

rina sawayama japan tour

TICKET INFORMATION

企画・制作・招聘: Live Nation Japan / クリエイティブマンプロダクション 協力: Universal Music Japan

企画・制作・招聘: Live Nation Japan / クリエイティブマンプロダクション 協力: Universal Music Japan / FM802

主催: J-WAVE 企画・制作・招聘: Live Nation Japan / クリエイティブマンプロダクション 協力: Universal Music Japan

rina sawayama japan tour

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【Purchasing Tickets from Overseas】

Ticket is available for customers outside of Japan via the links below. Please check the website for tickets available for purchase.

Ticket will be avialble on these websites 'til one week before the show date

JAN 17 Thu 2023 - AICHI:DIAMOND HALL OPEN 6:00pm / START 7:00pm ADV Standing 8,500JPY (tax incl. / 1drink charge) TICKET ON SALE:NOV 5 Sat Ticket Pia PIA Presale (English) 10/24(Mon)12:00~11/1(Tue)23:59 KYODO TOKAI :052-972-7466 ※Please notice we do not allow children preschool age (5 years old) and younger to enter the show / venue.

JAN 18 wed 2023 - OSAKA:Zepp OSAKA Bayside OPEN 6:00pm / START 7:00pm ADV Standing 8,500JPY (tax incl. / 1drink charge) ADV 2F Reserved seat 9,500JPY (tax incl. / 1drink charge) TICKET ON SALE:NOV 5 Sat Ticket Pia PIA Presale (English) 10/24(Mon)12:00~11/1(Tue)23:59 Kyodo Information :0570-200-888 ※Please notice we do not allow children preschool age (5 years old) and younger to enter the show / venue.

JAN 20 Fri 2023 - TOKYO:TOKYO GARDEN THEATER OPEN 6:00pm / START 7:00pm ADV S seat 9,500JPY (tax incl.) ADV S seat 8,500JPY (tax incl.) TICKET ON SALE:NOV 5 Sat Ticket Pia PIA Presale (English) 10/24(Mon)12:00~11/1(Tue)23:59 [email protected] ※Please notice we do not allow children preschool age (5 years old) and younger to enter the show / venue.

rina sawayama japan tour

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The devil works hard, but Rina Sawayama works harder. Fresh off the triumph of her UK and US headline tour, which sold out the Roundhouse in London and saw five-star reviews from The Guardian and NME, the newly minted British-Japanese pop star is following up her celebrated debut album SAWAYAMA with LP2, a colossally ambitious and utterly original record that marries intimate storytelling with arena-sized tunes. In between SAWAYAMA landing on over 50 album of the year lists, including the New York Times (#2), The Guardian (#3) and Rolling Stone (#6), a "superstar-in-the-making"(NME) TV performance on Jimmy Kimmel Live, starring alongside Keanu Reeves in John Wick: Chapter 4, and sparking a change in the BRITS and Mercury Prize eligibility criteria to ensure non-British nationals like Berwyn could be nominated, you'd be forgiven for wondering when she even sleeps.

But Rina -- whose whole raison d'être is bending huge chart influences and blockbuster melodies to her will with precision-tuned songwriting and powerful vocals -- is the rare pop artist for whom honesty is never not an option. Making LP2 was a hardwon battle -- one that didn't come easy -- and was written during a turbulent period in her life that saw her step back and focus on herself: "A lot of people ignore the symptoms of their emotional pain," she explains. "It's when I stopped that I was able to make something meaningful. I've worked hard, but I've also worked hard on my mental health."

Writing and recording LP2 coincided with Rina beginning intensive therapy to process a pain from her youth, and these 13 tracks act as a journey through the revelations and growth she experienced. The shimmery orchestral gloss of track Minor Feelings -- named after the poet Cathy Park Hong's book about the marginalization of the Asian-American experience -- belies the fact that "minor feelings are majorly getting me down," Rina says, quoting from the lyrics. "It sets the thesis for the record -- like Dynasty did [on SAWAYAMA]."

In the West London studio of her record label Dirty Hit, she spent a year and a half working on an album that melds chart-topper acts and pop genres -- "Garbage and Avril Lavigne and Shania Twain and Pussycat Dolls; and I was listening to a lot of Kacey Musgraves and Dolly [Parton] and Bon Jovi and Aerosmith," she reels off -- with an all-new slate of top-tier producer talent, including Paul Epworth (Adele, Florence & the Machine), Stuart Price (Dua Lipa, The Killers), and long-time collaborators Clarence Clarity and Lauren Aquilina.

"I like making weird ideas come to life," Rina laughs. "It's easier said than done." Take Shania Twain-inspired lead single This Hell, for instance: recorded during a marathon two-day recording session with Epworth and written with Aquilina, the glossily addictive pop-meets-country track is about the pansexual Rina spotting a poster informing her that she was destined for hell, combining classic Shania sass ("let's go girls" line included), glam rock riffs and tongue-in-cheek one-liners that shout out a pantheon of gay icons Britney, Whitney and Princess Di and are destined to be screamed on sticky dancefloors for years to come. "So much about queerness is about queer euphoria and queer humor -- I hope that song has that," Rina says. "Well, if all of us are going to hell, it sounds kind of fun!"

Rina was born in Japan but moved to London as a child and was raised by her single mother -- a relationship she lovingly pays tribute to on the soaring second single Catch Me in the Air, which combines the homespun Irish recorder-arranged catchiness of The Corrs and the vocal jumps of Ray of Light-era Madonna, and was debuted on her Dynasty tour to her rapturous fanbase, who call themselves Pixels. "I really wanted to write about this weird relationship with single parents -- you do catch each other in the air," she explains. "When my mum sees my shows now, she can't believe I've been able to made it work... It's like we're both flying through the air."

Clarity and Price share production duties on the track -- the former landing the most number of credits and the latter working on over half of the album -- and LP2 is a full-throated declaration of Rina's ambition to level up as a main pop girl with a difference, a route she began tracing with the acclaimed 2017 mini-album RINA and 2020's SAWAYAMA. "I just wanted to give that pop euphoria," she says. "I just wanna write big songs that make people feel seen."

Existing in rarefied spaces as one of the few East Asian faces around -- Rina studied politics, psychology and sociology at Cambridge and fronted fashion campaigns as a jobbing model prior to her music career -- only served to gird her determination to make her music a broad church that embraces everyone: "I'm always thinking, Who is this song for?" she explains. "Who is the main character? And who is that person speaking to?"

It's a philosophy underlined in the profoundly moving, Kacey Musgraves-esque LGBTQ country ballad Send My Love to John, written with Aquilina from the perspective of a mother apologizing to her queer child for not accepting them. "It's one of my favorites," Rina says. The tearjerker is inspired by a queer nonbinary friend who "has a difficult relationship" with their conservative mother, she explains, only for them to be offered the tiniest glimmer of hope when she ended a conversation with a casual "send my love to John," their current partner.

"They just broke down and said, 'This means so much to me, because my mum will never apologize,'" Rina recounts playing the song back to them. "I'm so happy I could have provided that relief for them."

LP2 isn't just a smorgasbord of monster hits-in-the-waiting -- it's also a bold and honest statement about the singer coming to terms with her own past and the jubilation of turning to the future. It also mirrors Rina's own mental health journey, beginning with her confronting her past and ending with the ecstasy of liberation from these dark feelings. Not for nothing does the word "euphoria" keep coming up in her discussion of the album: "I've designed the tracklist so it takes you on a journey and by the end you feel released by it," she explains, adding that the album was directly inspired by the insights she gained with her therapist. "Hold the Girl was the first song I wrote for the record at the end of 2020 -- I had gone to therapy and had a revelation, so I decided to write the song... That was the start of it, and then I started doing more intense therapy. I was crying before going into the studio and going into the studio to write about it."

LP2 is a testament to that personal evolution and the joyousness of finally emerging out the other side, thanks to tracks like Frankenstein, another bombastic Epworth banger that sounds like Garbage meets Girls Aloud and features Bloc Party drummer Matt Tong, and the thumping anthemic house of Holy, produced by Irish artist and producer For Those I Love and written with Nate Company, who also worked on standout SAWAYAMA single XS.

"It's a very adult record because it's really only fully understood when you become an adult and you can look back on experiences [you had] as a kid," Rina explains. "It's about escapism. It's about looking after yourself, reparenting yourself and finding yourself."

These are big songs in a big album, choreographing female emotion, despair and hope in a record that pulsates with the message that pop can be more complex, darker and so much more meaningful than your typical girl-meets-boy lyricism. "I'm still very much a maximal writer. I hate silences." And that's her down to a tee -- in a world that wants women to be quieter, Rina Sawayama is finding new ways to speak up.

Reviews 109

Rina is magical.

I love Rina’s performances so much as this is the second one I caught. I was able to see her for the first in Phoenix and this time in New Orleans and both were beyond words can describe!

Worth the show and more!

Rina puts on a show like no other! She gives you what you ask for and throws in a new flavor when you least expect it

Best concert ever

She is sooooo good! Vocals are unmatched and super great!

SLAY MAMA HOUSE DOWN BOOTS

the reviews are in.... and rina sawayama is a HIT!!!! not many people can claim to be both a rockstar AND and popstar but miss rina can <3 she is my favorite artist of the recent decade due to her ingenious songwriting and equally incredible stage presence. if you havent gotten into the queen yet, youre missing out!!!!

Rina at house of blues in new orleans

I really enjoyed the concert. I liked Rina's performance and the second opener's. I would have preferred a larger venue, as it was pretty small and there were instances as I could not see the stage clearly. Also I would have liked the opener information to be a bit more clear on ticketmasters website.

ABSOLUTELY INSANE

Rina is literally one of the best live performers. The entire show was so good and her theatricality is off the charts. Her vocals are so amazing live. I highly recommend.

The Best First Concert

This was my first concert I've ever been to and I had the best time. The openers were great. Rina was amazing and great performer she really put her all into her performance.

It was a great experience!! Rina performed really well and she was good in interacting with the crowd :)

Rina, Shola, and Summer, YOU GUYS ROCK!

It was a phenomenal experience to see Rina perform! This was my first live concert and I have to say, you guys killed it!!! The tech was perfect, the opening act, Empress Of, was perfect, your performances with Shola and Summer were perfect. Everything was perfect!!!! I love you guys and keep up the amazing work! Wish you guys much success and happiness!! 😊🥰❤❤❤

Santa Ana Observatory

She’s just absolutely incredible live! I had my concerns about how they would adapt the whole production to such a small venue, but god it was so good. It was so intimate, and I felt like she was an arms length away. The crowd had so much energy, and Rina really connected with the audience. She sounded flawless as usual. The band and dancers killed it. It was the guitarist’s last show and they gave her a beautiful send off. Honestly it was just a perfect show. I can’t wait to see her again.

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Rina Sawayama - The Dynasty Tour

$20 – $25, all_ages, ​ washington hall.

rina sawayama japan tour

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rina sawayama japan tour

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THE MOMENTARY WILL CLOSE AT 2 P.M. SATURDAY, March 9, UNTIL GATES OPEN FOR MOMENTOUS FESTIVAL TICKETHOLDERS.

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The devil works hard, but Rina Sawayama works harder.

In a world that wants women to be quieter, Rina Sawayama is finding new ways to speak up. Described by Lady Gaga as “an experimental pop visionary who refuses to play by the rules,” Sawayama fuses multiple pop genres into her own unique sound and voice that will leave you utterly spellbound. See her live on the Green at the Momentary this fall!

Opening Acts : Empress Of  and Disko Cowboy.

This concert is presented as part of the Momentary’s Live on the Green Concert Series on the Coca-Cola Stage. Held rain or shine.

Sensory Advisory:  This performance includes brightly flashing lights and atmospheric effects that might be triggering for guests with sensitivities to flashing lights or neurodiverse guests prone to sensory overstimulation. Viewer discretion is advised.

TICKET OPTIONS

$40 General Admission

$25 Student*

$200 Premium**

GET TICKETS

Book your parking pass in the garage, $10 per car.

Reserve your spot online or by calling the Box Office at (479) 657-2335 today. 

Not a member yet? Join today to enjoy priority access to concerts and member-only events all year long.

Please allow 24 hours for new memberships purchased online to process before purchasing your member-priced ticket. To purchase your membership and tickets together today, call our member priority line at (479) 418-5728 or by emailing [email protected] .

* Student tickets available to all guests under 17 or those with a valid student ID, presented upon entry. Limited quantity available. ** Premium tickets include access to an outdoor tented lounge and premium bar, plus a reserved standing-room-only zone located immediately in front of the front-of-house sound and light mixing tent. Limited quantity available.

ABOUT THE ARTISTS

The devil works hard, but Rina Sawayama works harder. Fresh off the triumph of her UK and US headline tour, which sold out the Roundhouse in London and saw five-star reviews from The Guardian and NME, the newly minted British-Japanese pop star is following up her celebrated debut album SAWAYAMA with LP2, a colossally ambitious and utterly original record that marries intimate storytelling with arena-sized tunes. In between SAWAYAMA landing on over 50 album of the year lists, including the New York Times (#2), The Guardian (#3) and Rolling Stone (#6), a “superstar-in-the-making”(NME) TV performance on Jimmy Kimmel Live, starring alongside Keanu Reeves in John Wick: Chapter 4, and sparking a change in the BRITS and Mercury Prize eligibility criteria to ensure non-British nationals like Berwyn could be nominated, you’d be forgiven for wondering when she even sleeps.

But Rina — whose whole raison d’être is bending huge chart influences and blockbuster melodies to her will with precision-tuned songwriting and powerful vocals — is the rare pop artist for whom honesty is never not an option. Making LP2 was a hardwon battle — one that didn’t come easy — and was written during a turbulent period in her life that saw her step back and focus on herself: “A lot of people ignore the symptoms of their emotional pain,” she explains. “It’s when I stopped that I was able to make something meaningful. I’ve worked hard, but I’ve also worked hard on my mental health.”

Writing and recording LP2 coincided with Rina beginning intensive therapy to process a pain from her youth, and these 13 tracks act as a journey through the revelations and growth she experienced. The shimmery orchestral gloss of track Minor Feelings — named after the poet Cathy Park Hong’s book about the marginalisation of the Asian-American experience — belies the fact that “minor feelings are majorly getting me down,” Rina says, quoting from the lyrics. “It sets the thesis for the record — like Dynasty did [on SAWAYAMA].”

In the West London studio of her record label Dirty Hit, she spent a year and a half working on an album that melds chart-topper acts and pop genres — “Garbage and Avril Lavigne and Shania Twain and Pussycat Dolls; and I was listening to a lot of Kacey Musgraves and Dolly [Parton] and Bon Jovi and Aerosmith,” she reels off — with an all-new slate of top-tier producer talent, including Paul Epworth (Adele, Florence & the Machine), Stuart Price (Dua Lipa, The Killers), and long-time collaborators Clarence Clarity and Lauren Aquilina.

“I like making weird ideas come to life,” Rina laughs. “It’s easier said than done.” Take Shania Twain-inspired lead single This Hell, for instance: recorded during a marathon two-day recording session with Epworth and written with Aquilina, the glossily addictive pop-meets-country track is about the pansexual Rina spotting a poster informing her that she was destined for hell, combining classic Shania sass (“let’s go girls” line included), glam rock riffs and tongue-in-cheek one-liners that shout out a pantheon of gay icons Britney, Whitney and Princess Di and are destined to be screamed on sticky dancefloors for years to come. “So much about queerness is about queer euphoria and queer humour — I hope that song has that,” Rina says. “Well, if all of us are going to hell, it sounds kind of fun!”

Rina was born in Japan but moved to London as a child and was raised by her single mother — a relationship she lovingly pays tribute to on the soaring second single Catch Me in the Air, which combines the homespun Irish recorder-arranged catchiness of The Corrs and the vocal jumps of Ray of Light-era Madonna, and was debuted on her Dynasty tour to her rapturous fanbase, who call themselves Pixels. “I really wanted to write about this weird relationship with single parents — you do catch each other in the air,” she explains. “When my mum sees my shows now, she can’t believe I’ve been able to made it work… It’s like we’re both flying through the air.”

Clarity and Price share production duties on the track — the former landing the most number of credits and the latter working on over half of the album — and LP2 is a full-throated declaration of Rina’s ambition to level up as a main pop girl with a difference, a route she began tracing with the acclaimed 2017 mini-album RINA and 2020’s SAWAYAMA. “I just wanted to give that pop euphoria,” she says. “I just wanna write big songs that make people feel seen.”

Existing in rarefied spaces as one of the few East Asian faces around — Rina studied politics, psychology and sociology at Cambridge and fronted fashion campaigns as a jobbing model prior to her music career — only served to gird her determination to make her music a broad church that embraces everyone: “I’m always thinking, Who is this song for?” she explains. “Who is the main character? And who is that person speaking to?”

It’s a philosophy underlined in the profoundly moving, Kacey Musgraves-esque LGBTQ country ballad Send My Love to John, written with Aquilina from the perspective of a mother apologising to her queer child for not accepting them. “It’s one of my favourites,” Rina says. The tearjerker is inspired by a queer nonbinary friend who “has a difficult relationship” with their conservative mother, she explains, only for them to be offered the tiniest glimmer of hope when she ended a conversation with a casual “send my love to John,” their current partner.

“They just broke down and said, ‘This means so much to me, because my mum will never apologise,'” Rina recounts playing the song back to them. “I’m so happy I could have provided that relief for them.”

LP2 isn’t just a smorgasbord of monster hits-in-the-waiting — it’s also a bold and honest statement about the singer coming to terms with her own past and the jubilation of turning to the future. It also mirrors Rina’s own mental health journey, beginning with her confronting her past and ending with the ecstasy of liberation from these dark feelings. Not for nothing does the word “euphoria” keep coming up in her discussion of the album: “I’ve designed the tracklist so it takes you on a journey and by the end you feel released by it,” she explains, adding that the album was directly inspired by the insights she gained with her therapist. “Hold the Girl was the first song I wrote for the record at the end of 2020 — I had gone to therapy and had a revelation, so I decided to write the song… That was the start of it, and then I started doing more intense therapy. I was crying before going into the studio and going into the studio to write about it.”

LP2 is a testament to that personal evolution and the joyousness of finally emerging out the other side, thanks to tracks like Frankenstein, another bombastic Epworth banger that sounds like Garbage meets Girls Aloud and features Bloc Party drummer Matt Tong, and the thumping anthemic house of Holy, produced by Irish artist and producer For Those I Love and written with Nate Company, who also worked on standout SAWAYAMA single XS.

“It’s a very adult record because it’s really only fully understood when you become an adult and you can look back on experiences [you had] as a kid,” Rina explains. “It’s about escapism. It’s about looking after yourself, reparenting yourself and finding yourself.”

These are big songs in a big album, choreographing female emotion, despair and hope in a record that pulsates with the message that pop can be more complex, darker and so much more meaningful than your typical girl-meets-boy lyricism. “I’m still very much a maximal writer. I hate silences.” And that’s her down to a tee — in a world that wants women to be quieter, Rina Sawayama is finding new ways to speak up.

Empress Of is your favorite artist’s favorite artist. The Honduran American producer, songwriter, and singer from Los Angeles has released three albums to date and is off touring her last EP Save Me , where she opened for Rina Sawayama and Carly Rae Jepsen. In the last year, she wowed audiences at festivals like Outside Lands and Corona Capital. Genre transcendent, Empress Of has collaborated with top-40 pop artist Khalid, multihyphenate performer Blood Orange, indie-rock sensation Jenny Lewis, and many more.

Born in 2007 with an iconic all-vinyl event, Disko Cowboy and Vinyl Ranch are the brainchildren of Dave Wrangler, redefining urban cowboy culture through the unexpected mashup of streetwear, country music, and disco nightlife themes. These days, Vinyl Ranch and Disko Cowboy bring a series of parties and nightlife events across the globe, as well as an ever-growing streetwear line. Disko Cowboy has shared the stage with a range of country idols from Hank Wiliams Jr to Jack Ingram, as well as produced events and collaborated with global brands such as Wrangler, Chanel, Tom Ford, Sundance Film Fest, SXSW, and many more.

WHAT TO EXPECT

  • Entry: Entry to the concert is located just west of the parking garage. Please be ready to show your mobile/printed tickets along with a valid ID.
  • Re-entry: No re-entry will be allowed for this show.
  • Note: There is an 8′ height limit for the garage.
  • Seating: You’re welcome to bring folding chairs and blankets for use on the Green. There will be a dedicated standing-room-only area in front of the stage for those who prefer to stand.
  • In addition, you can also carry a small clutch purse, no larger than 4.5” x 6.5”, with or without a handle or strap.
  • Bags will be screened as you enter. Security has final say on what is and isn’t permitted.
  • Fun Food and Drink: Hungry or thirsty? Enjoy the culinary creations of the Momentary Food Truck and fun beverages from the RØDE Bar before and during the show. No outside food or beverages will be allowed.
  • Cashless Event: Bring your credit or debit cards as we’re 100% cash-less.
  • Photos and Video: Capture your favorite concert moments with a point-and-shoot camera or your phone. But please leave professional cameras, drones, selfie sticks, tripods, detachable lenses, and audio or video recording devices at home.

For a complete list of guidelines, see our full Concert and Festival Rules.

WHAT TO BRING AND NOT BRING TO THE CONCERT

  • Valid ID and tickets to present upon entry.
  • Folding chairs and blankets to use in designated areas at mid-field and beyond.
  • Free water stations will be available. Empty plastic water bottles are encouraged to help stay hydrated. (No glass, metal, or opaque plastic containers.)
  • Bring your credit or debit cards. The festival is 100% cash-less.
  • Rain or shine, the show will go on! Come prepared with your sunscreen, hat, raincoat or a poncho.
  • All clear bags and clutch purses will be screened prior to entry. Security has final say on which bags will be permitted.

DON’T BRING

  • No outside food and drink, large bags, coolers, or ice chests. No pop-up shade tents or umbrellas of any kind.
  • No weapons or firearms of any kind are allowed, even if you have a permit. Laser pointers, glow sticks, and illuminating objects are strictly prohibited.
  • No fireworks, fuel, or explosive materials of any kind.
  • No skateboards, scooters, or wheeled devices other than ADA-compliant transport.
  • No kites, frisbees, inflatables, or air horns.
  • No illegal substances of any kind.
  • No smoking or vaping will be allowed outside of designated smoking areas.
  • No posters, signs, or promotional materials. Flyers and other promotional materials cannot be distributed on Momentary property without prior approval.
  • Prohibited items will not be admitted or checked. Please leave these items at home or in your locked vehicle.

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Rina Sawayama Announces U.S. Tour, Shares New Song “Hold the Girl”: Listen

By Rob Arcand

Rina Sawayama

Rina Sawayama has released a new song called “Hold the Girl.” The title track from her upcoming album , the single premiered on Clara Amfo’s BBC Radio 1 show Future Sounds , and the vocalist sat down with Amfo to discuss the song.

“‘Hold the Girl’ was the first song I wrote for the record at the end of 2020,” she said in the interview. “I had gone to therapy and had a revelation, so I decided to write this song… that was the start of [the writing process for the album]. I was crying before going into the studio to write about it.”

Sawayama has also announced that she’ll be heading out on a North American tour following the release of Hold the Girl . She’ll perform in 13 venues across the United States, kicking things off at Brooklyn’s Avant Gardner before trekking up and down the East Coast, through Texas and the Southwest, and into California, with her final date at the Hollywood Palladium in Los Angeles.

Hold the Girl is out September 16 via Dirty Hit . The album will include the recent singles “ Catch Me in the Air ” and “ This Hell ” and follow her 2020 self-titled debut album . Sawayama recently played “This Hell” on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon , and the song later received an Ali Kurr–directed music video .

Revisit Pitchfork’s 2020 Rising interview “ Rina Sawayama on Her Wildly Eclectic and Disarmingly Personal Debut Album .”

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Rina Sawayama: Hold the Girl Tour 2022

Rina Sawayama:

08-06 San Francisco, CA - Outside Lands Music and Arts Festival 08-20 Osaka, Japan - Summer Sonic Festival 08-21 Tokyo, Japan - Summer Sonic Festival 09-03 Stradbally, Ireland - Electric Picnic 10-12 Glasgow, Scotland - SWG3 10-13 Glasgow, Scotland - SWG3 10-15 Dublin, Ireland - Olympia Theatre 10-18 Nottingham, England - Rock City 10-20 Manchester, England - Manchester Academy 10-21 Birmingham, England - O2 Academy Birmingham 10-23 Brighton, England - Brighton Dome 10-24 Cardiff, Wales - The Great Hall 10-26 London, England - O2 Academy Brixton 11-01 Brooklyn, NY - Great Hall at Avant Gardner 11-04 Boston, MA - Roadrunner 11-05 Silver Springs, MD - The Fillmore 11-06 Charlotte, NC - The Fillmore 11-08 Atlanta, GA - The Eastern 11-09 Nashville, TN - Marathon Music Works 11-11 Dallas, TX - South Side Ballroom 11-12 Austin, TX - Emo's Austin 11-13 Houston, TX - White Oak Music Hall 11-16 Phoenix, AZ - The Van Buren 11-18 San Diego, CA - SOMA 11-21 Oakland, CA - Fox Theater 11-23 Los Angeles, CA - Hollywood Palladium

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Concert review: rina sawayama brings big energy, dynamic performance on dynasty tour.

rina sawayama japan tour

Wearing all red, Japanese-born artist Rina Sawayama took the Hollywood stage at The Fonda Theatre on Saturday. (Shengfeng Chien/Daily Bruin)

“The Dynasty Tour”

Rina Sawayama

The Fonda Theatre

rina sawayama japan tour

By Ashley Kim

April 10, 2022 9:26 p.m..

Rina Sawayama is boldly marking the grand beginning of her lineage.

The Japanese-born, London-based artist performed the first night of her tour’s North American leg in Hollywood, imbuing every corner of the room with her energy. Even late at night, Sawayama kept a tight grip on the audience’s attention with her alluring presence and vibrant performance. Despite the concert sometimes veering into lulls, her elegant yet ecstatic physicality was deftly complemented by two captivating dancers, a talented band and sparkling lights.

The stage was simple and decorated by a backdrop that sported Sawayama’s first name in a futuristic silver font and framed by her manicured hands. Beneath that, a raised platform provided depth to a relatively small stage and gave Sawayama and her dancers’ movements more dimension by emphasizing key moments of the set when they stood atop the platform. Although not the most spacious stage or elaborate set design, all the components of the setup were effective. Its economical nature was uncharacteristic for a flamboyant artist like Sawayama but worked to showcase her animated presence without overwhelming it.

Over the course of the 75-minute performance, the radiant lights played a large part in beautifully cultivating the mesmerizing atmosphere. They flashed in various combinations of colors, from deep red to jubilant rainbow, but were never more powerful than when they all turned off for emphasis, such as before the beat drop in “Love Me 4 Me.” At times, however, the lights were a bit excessive and flashed quickly at the audience, which could have been straining on the eyes for some.

[Related: Concert review: Oliver Tree’s over-the-top antics distract from music at Shrine Expo Hall show ]

Other than that, the sound was steady – never too loud or too soft – and sufficiently reached all members of the audience. The bass thumped through the floor, and its booming nature drove people to jump and dance along to the music. Despite the prominent rhythmic elements, Sawayama’s voice always won out, clearly enunciated and piercing through all other sounds.

In terms of audience engagement, Sawayama was a woman of and for the masses, nimbly measuring the audience’s energy level and feeding off or lifting it as necessary. Her transitions between songs were clever and smooth, such as the riling up and subsequent shushing of the crowd between her opener, “Dynasty,” and her second song, “STFU!” At one point, she asked, “Are you ready to slay?” which garnered an enthusiastic reaction from the audience in preparation for the rest of Sawayama’s set.

The Los Angeles concert was the first of Sawayama&squot;s North American tour, which primarily pulls from debut album "SAWAYAMA." (Shengfeng Chien/Daily Bruin)

The bigger transitions involved costume changes, of which Sawayama had three. She went from a bold, structured red number to a softer, flowing silhouette and then a grungy, cargo-based look, which all tied into the characteristics of the lively music performed in each section of the set. While she was making her quick change, the empty stage could have easily felt desolate, but the instrumentals of Sawayama’s songs that continued to play mostly kept the energy up.

The set list itself featured all the songs from her debut album, “SAWAYAMA,” and a select few singles and picks from her EP. Most of the songs were performed in a rock style, which was especially apparent in songs such as “Who’s Gonna Save U Now?” but some, like “Chosen Family,” were stripped down and sung acoustically while sitting on the platform. With her live twist on the tracks, the songs flowed well into each other, bridged by her witty comments and softer songs that lent emotional depth to the set.

[Related: Concert review: Still Woozy brings dizzying energy despite technical difficulties ]

As a visual complement to the set list, the dancers were mesmerizing – despite there only being two of them, they made their presence known on stage. Whether it was synchronized, sharp motions or snakelike, sensuous dance, they embodied the unique themes of each song while using all the stage space. The audience also fed off the dancers’ energetic movements, cheering during dramatic falls or pointed pops.

Sawayama’s movement was similarly captivating, whether it be lithe body rolls or angular arm movements, not only when she was dancing but also in her audience interactions when she reached out to the crowd. She did not neglect any side, moving across the stage and even acknowledging those on the balcony, trying her best to make everyone feel like they were a part of her chosen family.

Near the end of her set, Sawayama introduced an unreleased song, “Catch Me in the Air,” from her nearly finished second album, which was delivered emotionally, as it was written for her mother. And before closing out the night, she teased the audience by pretending to end the show before coming back onstage in a new costume to perform her hit “XS” with an ecstatic reaction from the crowd.

Sawayama is living up to her name as she establishes a new dynasty on tour.

rina sawayama japan tour

Concert review: Still Woozy brings dizzying energy despite technical difficulties

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Rina Sawayama Plots U.S. Tour Ahead of ‘Hold the Girl’ Album Release: See the Dates

She also shared the title track from her upcoming LP.

By Stephen Daw

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Rina Sawayama

As we inch ever-closer to the impending release of Rina Sawayama ‘s sophomore album, the singer is gearing up to bring her new songs to an even wider audience.

Sawayama announced her upcoming North American tour on Wednesday (July 27). Kicking off on Nov. 1 in Brooklyn, NY at Avant Gardner, the 13-date run will see Sawayama cross the U.S through Massachusetts, Maryland, North Carolina, Georgia, Tennessee, Texas and Arizona, before closing out with a show at the Hollywood Palladium in Los Angeles.

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Pre-sales for each of the dates are currently underway, with the full sale taking place Friday (July 29) at 10 a.m. local time on her website . The new tour will come just after Sawayama’s upcoming U.K. and Ireland leg, including her hotly anticipated performance at London’s O2 Brixton Academy.

Alongside the tour announcement, Sawayama shared “ Hold The Girl ,” the titular track off her forthcoming new LP. A post-disco, glitching anthem, the infectious new single tracks Sawayama’s embrace of her inner child, letting go of residual guilt from childhood trauma and letting her younger self know that “I won’t leave you on your own.”

Trending on Billboard

“‘Hold the Girl’ was the first song I wrote for the record,” Sawayama explained of the new single in the statement. “I had gone to therapy and had a revelation, so I decided to write this song … that was the start of it. I was crying before going into the studio to write about it.” She added a note to her fans on Twitter that the album’s release date had been pushed back to Sept. 16 due to production issues, “but I’ve added another single release so ur fed.”

Check out the full list of Sawayama’s U.S. tour dates, as well as her new single “Hold the Girl,” below.

11/1 – Brooklyn, NY @ Great Hall at Avant Gardner 11/4 – Boston, MA @ Roadrunner 11/5 – Silver Springs, MD @ The Fillmore 11/6 – Charlotte, NC @ The Fillmore 11/8 – Atlanta, GA @ The Eastern 11/9 – Nashville, TN @ Marathon Music Works 11/11 – Dallas, TX @ South Side Ballroom 11/12 – Austin, TX @ Emo’s Austin 11/13 – Houston, TX @ White Oak Music Hall 11/16 – Phoenix, AZ @ The Van Buren 11/18 – San Diego, CA @ SOMA 11/21 – Oakland, CA @ FoxTheater 11/23 – Los Angeles, CA @ Hollywood Palladium

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Rina Sawayama 2024 Tour & Tickets

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Rina Sawayama Tour 2024

Rina Sawayama tour 2024 announced : Rina Sawayama is a Japanese singer, songwriter, and model. She began her career as a model in 2007, and released her debut single "Somewhere" in 2010. In 2012, she released her debut album RINA, which peaked at number 2 on the Japanese Oricon chart. Sawayama has since released several singles and EPs, including the 2017 EP RINA. Her music has been described as "a unique blend of R&B, pop, and electronic music."

Rina Sawayama is a pop singer from London, and her music is a unique blend of R&B, pop, and electronica. She has been praised for her powerful vocals and catchy hooks, and her live performances are known for their high energy and infectious enthusiasm. If you're looking for an exciting new artist to add to your concert rotation, Rina Sawayama is definitely worth checking out. Catch her on tour in support of her self-titled debut album - tickets are on sale now!

Sawayama will be embarking on a world tour in support of her debut album RINA. The tour will kick off on September 7th in Tokyo, Japan and will make stops in North America, Europe, and Asia. Tickets for the tour are available now. Don't miss your chance to see Rina Sawayama live! If you are looking to see Rina Sawayama on tour, then be sure to check out the dates and concert schedule below. Rina Sawayama will be performing at a number of venues across North America, so be sure to buy Rina Sawayama 2024 tickets soon before they sell out!

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Rina Sawayama "Hold The Girl" Concerts Schedule

11/01: Brooklyn, NY - Great Hall at Avant Gardner 11/04: Boston, MA - Roadrunner 11/05: Silver Spring, MD - The Fillmore 11/06: Charlotte, NC - The Fillmore 11/08: Atlanta, GA - The Eastern 11/09: Nashville, TN - Marathon Music Works 11/11: Dallas, TX - South Side Ballroom 11/12: Austin TX - Emo’s Austin 11/13: Houston TX - White Oak Music Hall 11/16: Phoenix, AZ - The Van Buren 11/18: San Diego, CA - SOMA 11/21: Oakland, CA - Fox Theater 11/23: Los Angeles, CA - Hollywood Palladium

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‘I’m constantly on guard’: From Rina Sawayama to Nova Twins and Self Esteem, women share damning tales of misogyny in the music industry

After a report into the epidemic of misogyny and abuse in the british music industry, female musicians, managers, photographers, agents and a&rs share powerful statements about their own experiences to roisin o’connor and musician chloe little, article bookmarked.

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From Rina Sawayama (centre) to Self Esteem (bottom left) and Nova Twins (top right), women are sharing their accounts of misogyny in the UK music industry

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I n January this year, a damning report exposed the misogyny and abuse still rife in the UK music industry.

Despite increases in representation both in the charts and at awards ceremonies, it was found that female artists are still routinely undervalued and undermined , receiving fewer opportunities than their male peers.

The report also exposed the culture of silence that prevents survivors of sexual harassment, assault and abuse from speaking out, either out of fear of repercussions for their career or that they will be met with disbelief.

After The Independent reported on the findings, musician Chloe Little of the indie rock band Wings of Desire began reaching out to her friends and peers, to ask about their personal experiences of misogyny in the music industry.

She soon found herself inundated with responses from artists, managers, photographers, agents and major label employees, who shared their devastating accounts of sexism, racism, abuse, sexual assault and coercion.

Prominent British talents, such as critically adored artists Rina Sawayama, Nova Twins and Self Esteem, along with rising stars such as Lily Fontaine of the rock band English Teacher and Heather Baron-Gracie of Pale Waves, detailed their encounters with men who have gaslit them, assaulted them, patronised them, or punished them for attempting to call out the misconduct of other men.

The music industry has yet to face its MeToo moment. The Independent is sharing these stories – some on record, some anonymous, all brave – in the hope that it encourages more women to speak out, and that the British music industry will wake up and start holding those who abuse their power and influence to account.

Chloe Little – artist, Wings of Desire

Chloe Little, singer in rock band Wings of Desire

When the WEC’s report into misogyny in music was released, the findings were not surprising. I was disturbed that the culture has been deemed ‘endemic’, and yet I doubt you’d find any woman working in the music industry who hasn’t experienced some form of misogyny. From personal experience I know it’s an industry rife with discrimination, yet any conversations around what many women have endured always seem to be quashed.

The music business is a notoriously difficult industry to get into, and women face an entirely unique set of challenges. Women are discouraged and bullied out of what has been described as a ‘boys club’. As a teenager I tried desperately to form a band with boys at school, but none of them wanted to play music with a girl. Surprisingly it didn’t deter me and I continued with incredible naivety that things would change. Later on, I spent years being sent to writing sessions with “up and coming” producers in their forties, who often had studios in remotely located flats or even bedrooms. There was no safeguarding, you are gaslit into thinking this is how you prove you are worthy enough for a label to invest in.

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On one occasion, aged 19, I sent an award-winning producer some of my demos and he said that he’d love to work on them. This guy, a man in his fifties, called and said he had a song for me – but if I wanted it, I needed to visit his Mayfair hotel room that night to collect it. I was too scared to confront him, I just made a polite excuse as to why I couldn’t go and then I never heard from him again. The shame I felt for luxuriating in the fantasy that I was good enough stuck with me. It took years, but I finally found a support system and I now have a healthy creative partnership without compromise.

The visibility of female artists may be at an all time high, but this does not mean that women are not subjected to gross misogyny at every turn. We are expected to feel fortunate when we are thrown a few scraps. The power dynamic between female artists and the industry is often degrading, while male artists (specifically those that bring in huge profits for their major labels) seem to be protected and encouraged. Especially, when it comes to allegations of abuse of power towards their young female audiences. Change is desperately needed.

I wanted to speak to as many women in the UK industry as I could, and try to paint the most accurate picture of what it’s like for female artists, managers, agents, marketing executives, tour managers and more. The response has been overwhelming, I could not believe so many women were ready to talk to me about their experiences.

Rina Sawayama – solo artist

Rina Sawayama

Since summer last year, I’ve felt intense racist misogyny in a way that I’ve never felt before. In public and private I feel as though I’ve been repeatedly gaslit, disrespected, ignored, even cyber-bullied for calling out blatant racist and sexist behaviour. It’s horrifying seeing how the forts around men get built overnight and the techniques used to try to discredit and confuse the narrative. It’s been wild to see men and women around me turn.

I just want to leave this world a fairer, safer and kinder place for future generations to live in. That’s always been my mission from the start and I’ve always used my voice for this, but time and time again, women are punished for inconveniently holding a mirror up to men who were not willing to be held publicly accountable. My peers and I share stories and it’s clear there are a lot of men working in this industry who continue to get away with awful behaviour.

People feel like they can’t speak up. I don’t blame them – we’ve all seen what happens to women who do. But something needs to change.

The industry has improved since the days of Britney Spears and the UK tabloids of the Nineties and Noughties. That’s because of two reasons: powerful people have taken legal action and changed the landscape, and because the public has changed. The public has a much more sympathetic view on artists’ mental health and personal space. However, within the industry, behind closed doors, I’ve noticed how men are now weaponising the language of women’s mental health to masquerade misogyny. It’s unacceptable to say a woman is “crazy”, but I’ve heard phrases like, “I’ve heard she’s going through a really tough time, and she’s not acting like herself”. Often those very men are the ones causing the women distress.

I’ve been repeatedly gaslit, disrespected, ignored, even cyber-bullied for calling out blatant racist and sexist behaviour

Language like this allows misogyny to hide behind seemingly caring words. The problem is not that we are unwell, the problem is that the industry is unwell. I think we need to ask why that woman is unwell, and actively try and change the source of that distress. Often people don’t realise, or see what they are doing as misogyny.

Because it usually comes from us having to pretend that everything is ok and that the industry we work in is a fair one. What you might perceive as “acting out” is very likely caused by the fact that, for years, we have been forced to internalise the effects of this distress, instead of speaking out about it. But people are scared to lose their jobs on all levels of the industry, so most choose not to question it or even try to change it. Pretend it isn’t there. But if enough people have their eyes open, and enough people are willing to take the risk and use their voice, then the industry will change.

One thing that I want to see changed is this constant competition for relevance and being at the top. Being motivated by those things destroys one of the best bits about being an artist: the community. When you see other women as competition (and of course I’ve been guilty of thinking like that at times too) instead of a source of strength and support, then it fragments collective power and knowledge. Recently I’ve started reaching out to other artists more, and had younger artists reach out to me, and I’ve been loving the support I’ve received and am able to give back. I urge any artist to dedicate a portion of their time to help building that community. Ultimately, it protects us from the wild west of the music industry.

I don’t know a single woman in the music industry who has not experienced either misogyny or racism or both. Let’s take a second to digest that. I don’t know a single woman who has not experienced any or some of the following: sexual harassment, sexual assault, abuse of power, grooming, casual or systemic racism, causal or systemic sexism, gaslighting, being taken advantage of, inappropriate touch, unwanted sexual advances. This is just scratching the surface. Remember: this is our workplace. It’s absolutely unacceptable and needs to change for good - and I am determined to use my voice to make this happen.

Rebecca Lucy Taylor – artist, Self Esteem

Rebecca Lucy Taylor, aka Self Esteem

I desperately wanted to get Slow Club signed to an American label. After we played, the usual extreme drinking ensued. By the end of the evening the boss of the label grabbed me between my legs and asked if I would show him a “good time in London”.

It took many years to realise I did not “lose” an opportunity because I didn’t oblige. I cannot stress enough how much that this is one of many, many incidents in my 15 years in the music industry. The majority of this time has involved a vast power imbalance, and consequently the sustained threat of my career being in jeopardy, along with a near constant underscoring throughout my career that my worth is based solely on my appearance.

Lily Fontaine – lead singer, English Teacher

When I was at university, aged 20, I did a freelance shift as a member of a local crew for a load-in at Leeds First Direct Arena. I was exploring different areas of the music industry to see what I’d like to do after university, and the flexibility of the role really appealed to me. I was excited. I was assigned the role of helping to construct the video wall, as part of a team of maybe five or six people, led by a member of the artist’s touring crew – a white man in his mid to late-fifties.

English Teacher’s Lily Fontaine

The comments began immediately, from more distanced flirtatious comments like, “Is your mum single?” to more serious and direct sexual objectification, and with no let-up. The point where I decided I was never going to work there again was after the performance, when I was loading back into the lorries. The man decided to make a sexual comment in front of the rest of the male touring staff, all of whom watched and laughed at me while I continued to push flight cases around, holding back tears. I was told this was normal for women in the crew industry and the best thing to do was keep my mouth shut. That’s what I did, but every time I see a woman on load-in as a performing artist, I regret that decision, so it means a lot to talk about it now.

My ideas have been dismissed and then resold as someone else’s, and my concerns gaslit into thin air

In recent years, as a Black female musician, I’ve been patronised consistently despite over a decade’s worth of cross-industry experience. My ideas have been dismissed and then resold as someone else’s, and my concerns gaslit into thin air. Often these things happen publicly and no one says anything about it. That’s when you just want to throw your hands in the air and scream: “Am I crazy or is this industry a mess?” Of course, we all know the truth. I’ve heard more and worse stories from friends. This industry – like most industries operating under capitalism – financially and emotionally devalues its hardest working members and I believe that women, and especially working-class women and women of colour, feel that weight more than anyone.

Heather Baron Gracie – lead singer, Pale Waves

I find that I’m constantly grappling with the insidious presence of misogyny that taints the music industry; I’ve experienced a relentless onslaught of discrimination that makes it impossible to ignore. Men in positions of power seem to believe they have unrestricted authority to exert control over me, subjecting me to harassment and belittlement as if it’s their inherent right. Their abuse of invisible power dynamics is not only infuriating but deeply unsettling, creating an environment where I’m constantly on guard, feeling like I have to go above and beyond to prove myself.

Even within the studio, where creativity should flourish, I’ve found myself locked in a perpetual battle for respect and recognition. Despite being the driving force, I’ve been forced to fight for my ideas to be heard and considered by producers and collaborators. It’s been enraging to have seen my vision diluted or dismissed in favour of male perspectives, as if my voice is somehow less valid simply because of my gender. Every note, every lyric, every aspect of my art stems from my mind and my experiences, yet I’ve been forced to defend my right to creative autonomy at every turn.

I find myself locked in a perpetual battle for respect and recognition

Misogyny isn’t just a minor inconvenience in the music industry; it’s a pervasive and deeply ingrained systemic issue that threatens to overshadow the talent and creativity of countless female artists. I’ll continue to speak out against the sexism and discrimination that seek to diminish my voice and undermine my artistry. It’s time for the industry to reckon with its deep-seated misogyny and create a more equitable and inclusive space for all musicians, regardless of gender.

Rakel Mjoll – lead singer, Dream Wife

Rakel Mjoll, Dream Wife

When Chloe asked me to write about misogyny in the music industry, my mind went blank. Not because of any lack of lived experiences, but because of the overwhelming task of pinpointing it in separate threads. My experiences of misogyny are a tapestry of destructive socially accepted norms and behavioural patterns that I’ve encountered since my teenage years entering into the music industry. So I’ll start with the feeling of always feeling lesser to my male counterparts, despite my many accolades, achievements and education.

From my guitar teacher telling me, aged 12, that I should study violin because “girls don’t play electric guitar”, to my first teenage bands with men where comments about my appearance on stage were regularly discussed in band meetings, to being told by a male booker that we filled the one female/queer slot of his festival. So many times, I have been told – even by romantic partners working in music – that my youthful appearance and the fact that my music was “riding the feminist wave” (as if equality was a fad), were the reasons why a spotlight was briefly shining on me. Not the endurance, the hundreds of DIY shows or relentless work of my band and everyone we work with to get us an inch closer to our goal. That goal being a sustainable career.

Amy Love – singer/guitarist, Nova Twins

Before Nova Twins, I went to meet a male producer alone – something I would not do now. When I arrived, he was watching a previous music video I’d made. He was commenting on how “sexy” I looked in it. “Why don’t you want to look sexy again?” he asked. He told me I was too thin now and kept telling me I needed to eat a biscuit. I declined; I wasn’t hungry. But he persisted and it was easier to eat something in front of him than not.

He was too close to me... it was intimidating

After being grilled on my weight and being forced to eat, I had to go into the vocal booth feeling very uncomfortable, self-conscious and not in a good place to perform. At one point between takes, he came into the small booth to say something: he was too close to me and it felt intimidating. The energy felt wrong with him in my space.

On the train home, I pulled my jumper over my legs to cover them. I felt that the strangers around me were judging my body, as he did in the studio. I felt embarrassed and uncomfortable in my own skin, all because some producer thought it was OK to body-shame me.

Georgia South – bassist, Nova Twins

When I was 16, I had to help pack down a studio after a session. I was alone with a much, much older man, who told me I should put the mic head on like it was a condom. I remember feeling very uncomfortable and frozen, thinking how there was no one here but this man and me. Luckily a friend of mine came back shortly after, so I was able to leave quickly.

Izzy Bee Phillips – lead singer/guitarist, Black Honey

Izzy Bee Phillips, Black Honey

It starts with everyone questioning your ability to have platonic relations with your male band members, and really it’s kind of unending from there. On a casual level I have had tea served to me by young girls in a manager’s office meeting, run by all men, where the dialog was not dissimilar to that of a stag do. As they proceed to list me the reasons my first album “failed”. I had one of the best managers in the industry (who is female) tell me “to not get mixed up in all that feminism nonsense”, before also telling me her story of how she got made to sit on a radio plugger ‘ s lap when she started.

My personal experience with sexual assault is not something I am ready to talk about publicly, but I will say that it has scared me permanently and affects every working and romantic relationship with men. I was assaulted by both the music industry and by men working at the music university I went to. I have been bounced by security at my own shows because they don’t believe I am a frontperson. I have been watched getting changed in a dressing room by a promoter who was wolf - whistling at me while I was changing. I have been told by a male label head that I was too emotionally unstable to sign.

Most importantly , we know these experiences to be even harder for our intersectional minorities and women of colour. The endemic misogyny is very real.

Daisy Carberry – marketing manager, EMI / Activist Artists Management

Daisy Carberry, manager

I juggle a job at a major label with my work setting up a non-profit organisation aimed at getting gender minorities into music. I was once headhunted by a male director at a company I’d dreamed of working at. We met for a couple of informal interviews over coffee and I told him of my non-profit work. This was met with gushing enthusiasm and the promise of introductions to a host of incredible women he knew.

The director then offered me the position, requesting that I come and meet him and the team at an artist’s gig before I gave my final answer. I arrived already sensing red flags, feeling uncomfortable at the idea of a dark, sweaty, alcohol-fuelled environment accompanied by a man who was, ultimately, a stranger.

My suspicions proved correct – he spent the night with his arm draped round my shoulders, his face pressed against my ear as he proceeded to tell me why I should take the job. Unsurprisingly, I left and declined the position, and the man then rescinded his interest in helping my non-profit and all of his promised introductions.

It is the subtlety of misogyny that makes today’s industry more dangerous than ever before. Though pay gaps are published and festival lineups form viral conversations, who is there to protect us against the everyday dangers? Is anyone there to speak up when a male manager only addresses my male colleagues in a meeting? Or when a male artist invites me up to his hotel room after a promo trip? How far must they go for you to notice?

Louise Latimer – manager

When I was in my early twenties and working my first job in management, the head of a major publishing company asked me to meet him after work one day. I was thrilled and flattered, as I thought he was going to offer me a job. We went to a fancy hotel and he ordered rounds and rounds of martinis.

It was only when he tried to kiss me did I realise there was no job offer. I felt stupid and embarrassed. I told myself I’d been stupid to think I was desired for my talent, and that confidence kick had long-term consequences.

Katy J Pearson – solo artist

Katy J Pearson

I welcome the recent Women And Equalities Committee report, as it fosters a sense of support, acknowledgment and validation for our experiences. As someone who has been part of the music industry since my teenage years, I have often been in uncomfortable working environments with people – many of them complete strangers – who have made me feel unsafe as a young woman. Furthermore, the constant assumption that, as a woman, I don’t play my own instrument or write my own songs has been exhausting, frustrating and demoralising.

Charlotte Patmore – photographer

Charlotte Patmore, photographer

When I was starting out in the industry, I got to shoot a festival abroad with a high-profile magazine. This was a huge opportunity for me, however the deal was I wouldn’t get paid a flat fee and I had to cover my own expenses (flights and accommodation). I would only be paid if the shots I took made it into the magazine. I knew at the time this would be financially crippling, but the incentive of national coverage made the offer appealing and I would have to work hard to do the best job if I were to be financially rewarded.

One evening during the festival, a man from the magazine made a move on me. I was completely shocked, and when I said no he became angry. The punishment for rejecting him was that he cut the big feature I had been working on, so neither me or the journalist I went with got paid. The band we had worked with didn’t get any coverage. The repercussions for me saying no to his advances penalised everyone involved. I hated that he could use his power to hurt us all.

Sarah Joy – agent, ATC

Sarah Joy, music agent

From my experience, being a woman in the “back office” of the music industry often means being the only woman in the boardroom or backstage. The underrepresentation of women in general, but especially at the top end of the industry, is still a massive problem. While there are a few heavyweight female agents, managers, promoters, label reps, and a lot of up-and-coming ones, it still is very much a boys club, and all too often you are the only woman in that room. Often, this creates a power dynamic that is unhealthy for women to work in, whether from the threat of sexual assault to having people look down your top at conferences, to simply fighting to be taken seriously or having to be “aggressive enough” to be heard in a male-dominated space.

I find support from the other women around me, as well as from my supportive male colleagues. There is a great camaraderie between music professionals of both sexes who mentor and support each other through the unregulated murkiness of this industry.

When I was 22, I was given a job as a tour coordinator on a tour with a popular rock band. The band and crew were all male – I was treated like their assistant and made to do whatever they wanted. One of those tasks was to go to a band member’s hotel room after the show, and “hang out” with him, which involved giving him a shoulder massage and sitting with him on the bed, until he told me I could leave.

Once, after a bad show, the singer asked me to go back to his hotel room, as per usual, but this time he was in a real state. He tried to kiss me, and when I rejected him, he locked his hotel room door and said I couldn’t leave until I did. I said no to kissing because I didn’t “feel well”, so he made me lie next to him and give him a hug until he fell asleep. The door was still locked. When he eventually fell asleep, I unlocked the hotel room door and ran as fast as I could to where I was staying.

He said I couldn’t leave the room until I kissed him

The following day, I had to pretend like nothing had happened, and he ignored me for the rest of the tour. The male tour manager then sent me an email accusing me of getting too close to the band members and told me that I wasn’t good at my job but because I am ‘too close’ to the band and wouldn’t be invited back. The band member never spoke to me again despite seeing him multiple times.

Amy Walpole – lead singer, Witch Fever

Many things have happened to us over the years as a result of the music industry being patriarchal and a boys club, from being patronised and disrespected to more sinister incidents like upskirting, sexual harassment and assault.

Witch Fever

One thing that is a constant that happens at a lot of gigs is the male crew members’ assumption that we don’t know what we’re doing. One moment that stands out for me took place during a soundcheck: the sound guy was struggling to get my vocal mix right. He proceeded to lecture me about the vocal pedal and mic I was using, throwing loads of technical jargon at me and questioning me in front of everyone. He then asked me if I’d ever played a gig this size before (assuming that I hadn’t). The whole crew that day continuously referred to us as “young ladies” and “young girls”.

Our talent is constantly downplayed, with doubt thrown over whether we are worthy enough to be on the stage. We’re treated like kids and patronised. It’s a symptom of the music industry being so straight white male centric that anyone that isn’t a straight white male has to push very hard to be listened to. We’re forced to prove our worth to be on those stages just to gain a basic level of respect that most men get without even trying.

Laura Mary Carter – lead singer, Blood Red Shoes

Laura Mary-Carter

Before my band was signed, an A&R representative from a major label pulled me aside, suggesting I didn’t need my bandmate and should part ways with him. Subsequently, he began sending inappropriate texts, mentioning his children would love me and making unwelcome suggestions about visiting his house. Ultimately, it became clear he had no genuine intention of signing my band.

Alice Johnson – lead singer, Swim School

My first experience of playing a show was Swim School’s first ever support slot. As someone who had never played a gig in their life, never mind sung in front of anyone before, I was extremely nervous. As we took the stage to play to a sold-out room, we started tuning our instruments when I noticed a man trying to get my attention at the front of the stage. I panicked, thinking something had gone wrong, so I asked him if everything was OK.

Alice Johnson, Swim School

“Make sure your g-string is tight enough for me, love,” were the words that came out of his mouth, before he laughed and waltzed off back to his group of mates, who found it just as funny. I remember having to carry on playing the show as if nothing had happened, which would’ve been easier if he hadn’t heckled me all night with further inappropriate comments. I somehow managed to finish the set before I broke down in tears backstage, consumed by a heavy feeling of dread that every show was going to be like that. That this was going to be the reality of being a woman in music.

Five years on, I still experience incidents like this. The only difference now is that I don’t let them get away with it. As frustrating as it is, there is no greater thrill than standing up for yourself and putting someone who tried to intimidate and humiliate you in their place.

I had just accepted a new job at a label that exists within a bigger company. Before my start date, I was invited to drinks with the wider company: I knew no one except one person, my new boss. As the night progressed, I ended up sitting next to a man who was 40 years my senior, and who through conversation I learned was a notorious artist manager.

I was joining in on the conversation and asking him questions, until at the end of one of his stories he turns to me and openly says in front of all the other men in the conversation, “We should have sex.”

It felt like such a ridiculous statement in the moment that I laughed it off, but he kept going, saying “no really we should” and bringing it up again later in conversation multiple times, embarrassing me and making me feel so uncomfortable, in an environment/group of people I was totally new to. The other men in the conversation just laughed; I told him to f*** off in a lighthearted way and tried to change the subject.

I dreaded the moment he would come into the office

Once I’d started the role, I began to feel extremely uncomfortable every time he came into the office. I dreaded seeing him there because it was so awkward and I felt so creeped out by him. This manager is someone who is currently managing a young female artist, which fries my brain. Whenever the subject of this man’s behaviour is raised, the response is always: “Yeah, he’s gross but that’s just how he is and no one is gonna do anything about it.” I know this reaction will be alarmingly familiar to other women in the music industry.

Maria Torres – artist management, Mother Artists

Throughout my seven years in the music management sector, I’ve navigated countless situations where presumptions about my role were based solely on my gender, particularly within the dynamics of band and touring scenarios. Frequently finding myself as the lone female during soundchecks and load-ins, assumptions that I must be a band member’s ‘girlfriend’ persist, diminishing my professional standing. Even in recent encounters at music festivals, derogatory comments were directed at me while spending time with a male musician friend, highlighting the enduring prevalence of misogyny.

Maria Torres, manager

These experiences, though sadly familiar, prompt reflection on the absurdity that such biases persist. Despite the respect and recognition I’ve earned through hard work as an artist manager, these assumptive attitudes linger, unfairly affecting not just me but many women in the industry. It’s a frustrating reality that underscores the considerable distance we still have to travel for women to be acknowledged as equal counterparts in this field. The multitude of stories I hear regularly makes my blood boil. Let’s keep this conversation alive to shed light on the severity of misogyny in the music industry and work collectively for change.

Jessica Winter – solo artist

Jessica Winter

The most significant thing to say is that every negative experience I’ve had during my time as a musician has been a result of a gendered power dynamic. My examples come from male music managers and producers. I’m now a music producer myself, often running one to one sessions from a home studio and I’m fully aware there is a power dynamic when working with a young artist and I don’t abuse that.

One of the biggest strains misogyny has caused me is that as a woman you are taught you will expire at the age of 30.  I found there was an inordinate amount of pressure on the shoulders of a 17 year old aspiring pop star with a future lying only in the hands of older male producers, managers and record label execs. This resulted in feeling obligated to stay in dangerous and sexual environments like being obliged to go for drinks with someone after sessions to stay in the fold and then it ultimately leading to sexual advances, where you feel like you can’t say no without offending them and then never getting to work with them again.

Dodie – solo artist

Even the fact that I don’t feel as if anything I write about matters is a telling thing. We’re all aware by now that the world of music – especially the touring industry – is a boys ‘ world. I keep stickers in my bag that say “no bin by a toilet is sexist!” for the venues where I’m left sat on the toilet wondering whether I should just leave my items in protest or carry the thing around with me. I got so tired of breathing through the shriek that builds up in me whenever I am not listened to that I learned to shout a little more, and I don’t like it... but what are we supposed to do when no one is listening?

Chloë Black – solo artist

Chloe Black

My experience of misogyny in the music business began with the very first demo I ever sent out. I’d been working two jobs to pay for these recordings and the only feedback I got from the A&R in question was that I was “too ugly”. He saw my photo and dismissed me out of hand. This would be the first of many comments like that and so much worse. One producer I got to work with was married with children. We would work together and he would often try to kiss me whilst I was playing piano and his wife was nearby. I was terrified.

I’ve been abused, raped and threatened

What followed was a slew of predatory men making false promises and knowingly abusing their power. When I did my first big label showcase, the A&R who had brought me in kissed me on the lips in front of my manager right before I had to sing in front of LA Reid. A music publisher once spent an entire evening telling me about how he had elaborately proposed to his new fiancé only to later (completely out of blue) start masturbating in front of me. I was horrified and never told anyone because I knew that I likely wouldn’t be believed and would end up being the only person to be punished by saying something. I still see him to this day at Grammy parties and various music events where I have to try to hide my body’s uncontrollable shaking response.

I was drugged by an A&R exec who I later found out has had other allegations and was fired from his most recent label job for sexual misconduct. My physical appearance was constantly picked apart even by women in the industry. I’ve been called “too old” since the age of 25. I’ve been called ‘aggressive’ for emails so benign they could’ve been written by a toddler. I have spoken to label HR and ended up in tears after being repeatedly asked, “Are you sure?” I was abused, raped, had my life threatened and have been victim-blamed relentlessly. I now have very debilitating diagnosed PTSD that makes every aspect of my daily life incredibly difficult, and it is thanks to a business where rape culture is not only normalised but expected.

Rape Crisis offers support for those affected by rape and sexual abuse. You can call them on 0808 802 9999 in England and Wales, 0808 801 0302 in Scotland, and 0800 0246 991 in Northern Ireland, or visit their website at www.rapecrisis.org.uk . If you are in the US, you can call Rainn on 800-656-HOPE (4673)

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The Independent

Rina Sawayama can’t release another album ‘under her current conditions’

rina sawayama japan tour

  • Oops! Something went wrong. Please try again later. More content below

Rina Sawayama has told fans that she “feels really trapped” by her deal with label Dirty Hit Records , and that she “can’t release another album under my current conditions”.

The Brit Award-nominated musician and actor, 33, made the statement on Instagram as she shared an article she contributed to for The Independent to mark International Women’s Day.

In the piece, which also featured contributions from artists such as Self Esteem, Nova Twins and English Teacher’s Lily Fontaine, Sawayama addressed the “intense racist misogyny” she says she has experienced “since last summer”.

She was seemingly referring to the moment she appeared to call out her labelmate, The 1975 frontman Matty Healy, at Glastonbury Festival over his controversial remarks on a US podcast.

Later that day, the British-Japanese artist shared the article to her Instagram page, where she apologised to her fans and spoke about her mental health struggles.

“I’m sorry if I’ve let you down, my fans have been the shining light in all this,” she wrote. “You’re always so supportive of me and I appreciate it so much.

“I’ve been lucky to have found ways to keep my business afloat and support myself as well as my team, but when it comes to new music I can’t release another album under my current conditions. I feel really trapped and don’t know what to do.”

Sawayama added that she “felt enlivened by the strength” in The Independent story, but had also “cried at how truly rotten the industry is.”

Rina Sawayama (Charlotte Rutherford)

“This is just a FRACTION of what actually goes on,” she wrote. “I’ve heard more stories like this, some worse, in private from other artists. There are men who have done horrible things to multiple women who have very secure jobs in high places. It’s truly terrifying.

“Like I said in the article I don’t know a single woman who has not experienced some form of misogyny. As someone whose passion in music at school was taken advantage of by a music teacher who proceeded to then groom me for several years in my teens, it starts young. The music industry is absolutely due a MeToo movement and we need your amplification.

“Otherwise these artists will disappear from the industry. I don’t want any young person to ever have to experience what some of these women have. I want men to amplify this too. This is our workplace and women don’t deserve to be treated like this. This is not some rite of passage and this needs to stop.”

Sawayama is currently signed to Dirty Hit, the UK label co-founded by Healy and Jamie Oborne, The 1975’s manager. The Independent understands that she is on a three-album deal, and has to date released two records, including last year’s critically acclaimed Hold the Girl .

The Independent has approached Dirty Hit Records for comment.

At Glastonbury last summer, Sawayama introduced her song “STFU!” onstage by sayinng: “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.”

Healy spoke about having watched Ghetto Gaggers – a brand of racially charged pornographic videos in which women of colour are reportedly put in submissive positions to white men – during an appearance on the Adam Friedland Show podcast.

The podcast also featured segments in which Healy made reference to the US rapper Ice Spice. The hosts of the podcast mistakenly identified the rapper as being from Hawaiian Inuit and Chinese heritage, mocking each accent.

Healy issued an apology of-sorts to Ice Spice while onstage with The 1975 in Auckland, New Zealand. “I just feel a bit bad, and I’m kind of a bit sorry if I’ve offended you,” he said.

“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***. I love you, Ice Spice. I’m so sorry.”

Healy also addressed the podcast controversy in an interview with The New York Times last May.

Asked if he had been “baiting” his fans with the remarks, he said: “A little bit. But it doesn’t actually matter. 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.”

The interviewer then suggested that “maybe” this does happen, prompting Healy to respond: “If it does, you’re either deluded or you are, sorry, a liar.

“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.’ And I kind of want them to do that, because they’re demonstrating something so base level.”

rina sawayama japan tour

Rina Sawayama

Rina Sawayama Announces Debut Australian Tour For 2023

By Alex Gallagher

Japanese-British pop phenom Rina Sawayama has announced she’ll tour Australia and New Zealand for the first time early next year, revealing four dates for January 2023 in support of forthcoming album  Hold the Girl .

The tour will kick off in Auckland on Monday, 9th January, continuing along to Sydney and Melbourne before wrapping up in Brisbane on Saturday, 14th January. See dates and venues below. Tickets will go on sale this Friday, 9th September at 9am, with a Live Nation pre-sale kicking off this Wednesday, 7th September from 9am.

Rina Sawayama – ‘This Hell’

Hold the Girl , Sawayama’s second studio album, is set to arrive on Friday, 16th September. The singer-songwriter announced the follow-up to her 2020 debut  SAWAYAMA back in May alongside lead single ‘This Hell’. Since then, Sawayama has released three more singles from the album: ‘Catch Me in the Air’ in June, the record’s title track in July, and ‘Phantom’ last month.

Earlier this year, Sawayama joined Charli XCX on   the single ‘Beg for You’ from the latter’s  Crash  LP, and Brazilian singer-songwriter and drag queen Pabllo Vittar on ‘Follow Me’. Last year saw her team up with Elton John for a new rendition of her song ‘Chosen Family’, cover Metallica ‘s ‘Enter Sandman’ for The Metallica Blacklist and feature on a remix of Lady Gaga ‘s Chromatica track ‘Free Woman’.

Rina Sawayama 2023 Australian and New Zealand Tour

  • Monday, 9th January – Powerstation, Auckland
  • Tickets: Live Nation
  • Thursday, 12th January – Roundhouse, Sydney
  • Friday, 13th January – 170 Russell, Melbourne
  • Saturday, 14th January – The Triffid, Brisbane

Further Reading

Rina Sawayama Does It All, And Now She’s Ready To Do More

Listen To Rina Sawayama’s New Version Of ‘Chosen Family’ With Elton John

Listen To Rina Sawayama Put A Pop-Metal Spin On Metallica’s ‘Enter Sandman’

Alex Gallagher

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Rina Sawayama Says She "Can't Make Another Album Under These Conditions"

The pop star feels "trapped" in her deal with Dirty Hit, which Matty Healy (who she's called out for racism and misogyny) is a shareholder in

rina sawayama japan tour

BY Megan LaPierre Published Mar 8, 2024

Sharing a new story, published by The Independent , about misogyny in the music industry where she claims she has been "repeatedly gaslit, disrespected, ignored, even cyber-bullied for calling out blatant racist and sexist behaviour," Rina Sawayama has admitted that she feels like she "can't make another album under these conditions."

The pop star wrote a lengthy caption in an Instagram post about the piece, published in honour of International Women's Day (IWD). "It's the first time I've been honest about my past year (or to a level of safety I feel safe to)," Sawayama said of the interview she gave to Roisin O'Connor and Chloe Little. "Honestly my mental health has been awful, and though I was able to complete my 2023 commitments I can't say it's been the same this year."

"When it comes to new music I can’t release another album under my current conditions," she continued. "I feel really trapped and don’t know what to do."

The singer-songwriter is currently signed to Dirty Hit Records , which each member of the 1975 has been a shareholder in since 2019. Frontman Matty Healy — who Sawayama called out during her Glastonbury performance last year, dedicating her song "STFU!" to a "white man" with a controversial podcast appearance when the internet was all abuzz about his discussion of Ice Spice's ethnicity — also served as the label's creative director for four years up until stepping down from the role last April. "He also owns my masters," Sawayama said on stage at the festival. "I've had enough!"

"I’ve felt enlivened by the strength in this article, but I’ve also cried at how truly rotten the industry is," she wrote today. "This is just a FRACTION of what actually goes on. I've heard more stories like this, some worse, in private from other artists. There are men who have done horrible things to multiple women who have very secure jobs in high places. It’s truly terrifying."

Sawayama has previously opened up about how being groomed by a male teacher as a teenager informed much of her 2022 sophomore album, Hold the Girl . See her Instagram post below.

View this post on Instagram A post shared by Rina Sawayama (@rinasonline)

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Rina Gonoi attends White House ceremony for women of courage award

Rina Gonoi (center) receives an award from U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken at a ceremony in Washington on Monday, with First Lady Jill Biden standing next to her.

Rina Gonoi, a former Ground Self-Defense Forces member, attended a White House ceremony on Monday as one of the recipients of an award honoring women who have taken courageous actions to fight for a better world.

"Together, we will keep chipping away at the quiet that haunts our world, and while there may be those who wish for us to fall silent, we will never fall because the steepness of the struggle will not stop our ascent," she said.

With 11 other women from countries such as Bangladesh, Belarus, Iran and Myanmar, Gonoi received the Secretary of State's International Women of Courage Award for leading a public campaign against sexual harassment.

Gonoi, 24, who was sexually assaulted while serving in the GSDF, attended the ceremony wearing a judo outfit. She did not make comments at the event.

She is the first Japanese woman in nine years to be selected as a recipient of the award, which started in 2007. In 2015, Japanese activist Sayaka Osakabe was commended for her fight against "maternity harassment," or unfair treatment of pregnant working women.

Gonoi came forward in 2022 as a victim of long-term sexual harassment and abuse by colleagues in her unit. Her actions drew attention and led to Japan's Defense Ministry receiving more than 1,400 reports of sexual and other forms of harassment within the Self-Defense Forces.

In December, a Japanese court found three former male colleagues of Gonoi guilty of sexual indecency.

At the ceremony, Blinken said, "The United States stands with every woman of courage working to build greater stability, greater equality and greater opportunity."

"Supporting women and girls is not only the right thing to do, it's the smart and necessary thing to do, and we know this in so many different ways," he said. "Simply put, when women do better, we all do better."

Rina Gonoi (center) receives an award from U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken at a ceremony in Washington on Monday, with First Lady Jill Biden standing next to her.  | Kyodo

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