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The Brits are done now and what have we learned? Firstly, that no song cannot be improved with the addition of a booming Elton John vocal. Secondly, that no-one in the world has a better wardrobe for British outdoor dining season than The Weeknd. But mainly? We learned that when you finally give women the credit they deserve for their work they'll make sure to pass the mic to other people who deserve attention too.
That's right. At the Brit Awards 2021 the women of pop finally got the glory that female artists of the genre have always deserved but not always been given. It makes a big shift from last year when only one out of the 25 nominated artists for mixed gender categories was female.
Little Mix became the first female group ever to pick up Best British Group (honestly, madness that this is a first) and celebrated with a powerful speech that paid tribute to the girl bands that had paved the way for them.
'It’s not easy being a female in the UK pop industry. We’ve seen white male dominance, misogyny, sexism and lack of diversity. We’re proud of how we’ve stuck together, stood our ground, surrounded ourselves with strong women and are now using our voices more than ever,' said Leigh-Anne Pinnock. Jade Thirlwall followed up with: 'The fact that a girl band has never won this award really does speak volumes. So this award isn’t just for us, it’s for the Spice Girls, Sugababes, All Saints, Girls Aloud, all of the incredible female bands - this one’s for you!'
Dua Lipa picked up Best British Artist and talked in her speech about how, the last time she won Brits in 2018, she had called out the awards ceremony for not celebrating female artists enough. She said that she was excited to see a shift this evening: 'Really is such an honour to be part of this wave of women in music.' Then finished with a little word to the government for not giving key workers a pay rise in the recent budget. 'Give Boris a message that we all support a pay rise for our frontline,' she said. She went on to win Best British Album and used her speech to pay tribute to Jimi Olubunmi-Adewole who died after jumping into the Thames to save a woman from drowning in April.
Elsewhere, Arlo Parks won Breakthrough Artist, Griff won Rising Star, Haim won Best International Group and Taylor Swift became the first female artist to win Global Icon (and accepted with a speech about using other people's resistance and cynicism to fuel you).
It was all very, very good stuff to see. Especially when you take into account that fewer than one in five songs played on British radio in 2020 were by women and that a study of 800 'top songs' from 2012-2019 found that only 23 percent of artists and only 2 percent of producers were women. We need better representation fast.
Basically, we're glad that female artists are finally getting the respect they deserve in the industry. Even if we did have to watch two hours of Jack Whitehall babbling on to find out about it.
Find out all of tonight's Brit Award winners.
Everything you need to know about this year's Brit Awards.