Little Mix’s Leigh-Anne puts race front and centre...
SHE was catapulted to fame 10 years ago after winning The X Factor, but Little Mix star Leigh-Anne Pinnock says she has often felt invisible. “I’m so grateful for this crazy, ro l l e r- coaster life,” says the 29-year-old, who this week picked up a Brit award when Little Mix became the first girlband to be named Best British Group. “But sometimes I felt like I was being treated differently to my band mates because of the colour of my skin.”
She says that she often felt ignored at signings and never heard her name cheered. But on tour in Brazil last year, a largely black audience was yelling her name – that’s when she wondered if race had always played a part.
“I had never felt so accepted,” she says. Leigh-Anne, born to parents with Caribbean heritage, embarks on a very personal journey, but is acutely aware that she comes from a place of privilege.
“I’ve been in a pop bubble,” she says. “I only know my own experiences.”
But it’s admirable that she wants to use her platform to make a difference and this is a heartfelt journey that sees her confront difficult questions. She asks her first choreographer Frank Gatson about the time he advised: “You’re the black girl, you have to work 10 times harder”.
She also chats to a group of black and mixed-race pop stars including fellow X Factor star Alexandra Burke and Sugababe Keisha Buchanan. Most uncomfortable is her chat with her fiancé Andre Gray, who wrote offensive tweets about black women in 2012. The pair recently revealed they are expecting their first child together. Finally, she confronts her record label about what they can do to make positive change.
She says: “We can’t keep ignoring this issue.”