For the past eight years, Little Mix has proven to be the girl group of the decade. With their fierce bops, perfect fashion and amazing messages of empowerment, they have inspired girls all over the world to embrace their true selves and spread the good vibes of girl power. Since they are doing exactly all of this for their fans, then why are they still not being recognized by the mass media, particularly in the U.S.?
If you're reading this article I'm assuming you have heard of this group somewhere on Instagram or through your friends, but this is the very problem at hand- they aren't being talked about nearly as much as they should. Without the power of social media, this group wouldn't be as internationally famous as they are (I know I'm being a bit harsh here, but it's the truth). If you're an American Mixer like me then you know exactly why I'm saying this, but if you aren't let me care to explain.
Since these girls are based in the U.K. it is obvious that they will be bigger there than anywhere else. But then a year or so after they were formed and won "The X Factor" in 2011 (the first group to do so in the show's history — even after One Direction!), they started to become big in Australia and New Zealand. This is understandable, of course, since these countries are practically cousins of one another, and the girls started to tour and visit there regularly. Then 2013 comes around, and Little Mix is starting to create a little bit of buzz in The States.
Take it from a fan who started to love these girls when their first album wasn't even available in America yet and my mom literally ordered it straight from England for me for Christmas — these girls were beginning to be talked about across the pond in a relatively short amount of time thanks to none other than social media. I remember fanbases starting to sprout on Twitter for a lot of big names and these girls seemed to have a lot of fans here. And low and behold, this finally caught their (management team's) eyes and they ventured over here for a country-wide album signing tour that summer.
Back then I really did think it was the start of their big takeover here in the U.S.: their album was in the Top 5 upon its American debut and thousands of fans showed up for each event (I went to their first signing in Jersey, fun fact). Little did I know that this was going to turn out to be far from the truth.
When their second album dropped the following year, the group announced a second headlining tour with their first inclusion of North America. I was super excited hearing the news about this, and I even became thrilled when I was able to get my friends and I reasonably priced VIP tickets. Fast forward three months and I get a Twitter notification saying how this leg of the tour was canceled because "making an amazing 3rd album had to take priority." As a singer myself I completely understood this, but from a PR perspective, this was probably the stupidest move to make.
From then on they were able to produce three more albums and even served as the opening act for both Demi Lovato and Ariana Grande's tours in the United States. All of these albums had big numbers in sales and streams across the board and they even were trending numerous times on Twitter. Besides their music being featured in the background of movie trailers and TV shows, and a good couple of performances on live American television, that is all we really hear of Little Mix in America.
The point I am trying to make after explaining all this background information is that Little Mix seems to only be a social media phenomenon rather than one in the American music industry. The numbers can prove this statement wrong, yes, but without word of mouth I'm afraid to admit that these amazing girls might not have become as big of a deal in the U.S. as it seems.
Think about it my fellow American music fans — do you ever hear a Little Mix song on the radio or see them featured in our magazines regularly? Has E! or TMZ talked about them at all, other than when Perrie and Zayn broke off their engagement? Of course, England is different from America in the game of "Who Is More Famous Where" (take Robbie Williams as an example), but Little Mix can easily be just as big here when the numbers of sales and fans have proven over the years that they could.
The whole reason as to why this gets me angry is because these girls have got it, and I mean it. Each of them has their own great and unique singing abilities, but once they harmonize together (and very well, at that) it creates something so special that is different from anything music has heard before. Even their style of music within each of their albums is different from any other artist out their right now. Hell, I think they are one of the very few big-named girl group out there that are still together at the moment, so why aren't they getting more praise?
They've collaborated with HUGE names like Missy Elliot and Nicki Minaj, so why haven't they made U.S. entertainment headlines yet? I see Mixers on Twitter get enraged at the fact that they aren't getting recognized in America at the level they should be, and it honestly bothers me all the same too.
I don't know if fate is deciding whether it isn't their time yet (but let me tell you, LM5 really does seem like it's their time to shine in America) or their record label isn't doing enough promotion here, but their time to shine here is long overdue. I have heard in many interviews of the girls that their biggest dream is to make it big in America and even want to headline their own show at Madison Square Garden, and they truly deserve it. They are so utterly talented and can perform like no other (seriously, YouTube them if you haven't seen them perform live yet), let alone that they put their all into each of their projects and albums.
So with all this being said, American Music Industry listen up: Little Mix is a force to be reckoned with in today's music world and they are exactly the kind of artist we need right now. They prove to have the killer fashion, empowering mindsets and most importantly genuine talent, and this all and then some makes the perfect mixture for being a great artist. Once you multiply that by four and realize that they are all female, it is obvious that they are the group that should be recognized in a world where we still talk about equal rights and raising little girls right. They deserve such praise and way more hype — just as much as any other female artist out there at the moment — and it shouldn't take them eight years to achieve this in the land where they have already gained thousands of beloved fans.
