Gang Of Youths, Paul Kelly, A.B. Originals, Amy Shark, Illy and Jess Mauboy lead ARIAs nominations

THERE are only a few categories where a female artist was not represented at this year’s ARIA Award nominations. SEE THE FULL LIST.

THERE was a collective “hell yeah!” from Australia’s female artists at the 2017 ARIA Awards nominations in Sydney.

Pop princess Jessica Mauboy and indie singer songwriter Amy Shark each collected an impressive six nominations and Sia is up for five trophies at this year’s awards to be held on November 28.

In a year when gender equality has been in the spotlight in the Australian music industry, there were only a few categories, including Best Hard Rock and Adult Contemporary Albums where a female artist was not represented.

Other nominees included the much-loved country superstars Kasey Chambers and The McClymonts alongside a rollcall of exciting new talents such as Tash Sultana, Vera Blue, Meg Mac, Julia Jacklin and Tkay Maidza.

Sisters doing it for each other at the 2017 ARIA Awards nominations. Jessica Mauboy, Vera Blue and Kasey Chambers at the Art Gallery of NSW. Picture: Justin Lloyd.

Katie Noonan, whose Songs Of The Latin Skies album with guitarist Karin Schaupp won Best World Music Album on Tuesday, said now the industry should work harder to get a woman on the ARIA Board which runs the awards and represents the country’s record labels.

“I am so excited about the women coming through; they are total bad asses,” she said.

“This is my fifth ARIA but my first with a female collaborator and I thought it was timely to remind women in the industry that it is important for us to support each other. There should be more collaborations.”

Chambers, who has won the Best Country Album award every time she has been nominated since 1999 with her debut solo record The Captain, said she felt the groundswell for female representation was also being championed by the men in the industry.

“Men are embracing these changes in creative fields, they are as happy as we are to have more women involved,” she said.

Jessica Mauboy has six ARIA Awards nominations. Picture: Brett Costello

Mauboy has always been a big supporter of the crazy circus that is the ARIA awards nominations and was the only major nominee to make the event this year.

Everyone else was either touring or decided not to set their alarm for the nominations event which is held at the brutally un-rock’n’roll hour of 9.30am at the Art Gallery of NSW.

Mauboy, who will return to our television screens later this month on the second series of The Secret Daughter, was overwhelmed by the strong showing of indigenous artists in this year’s list, with A.B. Original and Dan Sultan joining her on the leader board.

“It makes me really proud,” she said. “They have all worked hard for it.”

“I am a big fan of Briggs (A.B. Original and want to collaboprate with them; hopefully one day I will.”

Top of the nominations leaderboard for this year are London-based indie rockers Gang Of Youths, whose acclaimed second album Go Farther Into Lightness has scored nods in eight categories.

They already have one of the dangerously pointed trophies going straight to the pool room, having being named Producer of the Year for their Springsteen-channelling record at the annual ARIA Awards nominations event in Sydney on Tuesday.

London-based Gang Of Youths lead the 2017 nominations. Picture: Supplied.

Paul Kelly, who is currently touring Europe, also added two awards — Engineer of the Year and Best Cover Art for his first-ever No. 1 album Life Is Fine.

Ir received seven nominations in total, including Album of the Year and Best Male Artist.

And Kelly also has two albums contending different categories this year with Life Is Fine up for Best Adult Contemporary record while his Death’s Dateless Night collaboration with Charlie Owen will battle it out for the Best Blues & Roots Album.

Life is indeed fine for Paul Kelly who has seven nods in the honour roll. Picture: James Croucher.

The incendiary indigenous hip hop duo A.B. Original, whose breakthrough single January 26 provoked a national debate about switching the date of Australia Day, were also celebrated by their industry peers in the nominations voting.

The revered pair of rapper Briggs and producer Trials scored six nominations for their debut album reclaim Australia including Album of the Year and Best Group.

A.B. Original members Adam Briggs and Daniel "Trials" Rankine are favourites to win some trophies at this year’s ARIAs. Picture: Justin Kennedy

Illy, who shifted his hip hop into the pop arena with the chart-topping single Papercuts, featuring Vera Blue, has also been nominated in six categories including Album of The Year and Best Male Artist.

One of the most exciting new talents to emerge on the Australian airwaves this year was Amy Shark and she tours America with Vance Joy, her peers rewarded her with six ARIA nods including Album of the Year and Best Female Artist.

The awesome singer songwriter Amy Shark is also up for six gongs. Picture: AAP Image/Claudia Baxter.

Mauboy isn’t the only artist to be nominated for a seventh year running.

Guy Sebastian is also on the honour roll for 2017 with his single Set In Stone to be considered by fans in their votes for the Apple Song Of The Year.

The Wiggles have been nominated every single year in this millennium, winning Best Children’s Award a phenomenal 10 times just in that period alone.

But they face some friendly competition from one of the best mates for the 2017 gong. Not only does Jimmy Barnes feature on their The Wiggles Duets album but his collaboration with the king of the kids on the Och Aye the G’Nu! is also up for the award.

Will it be the Wiggles album with Barnesy or the Barnesy album with The Wiggles to win Best Children’s record? Picture: Sam Ruttyn.

One of the other big nominees this year was Sydney singer songwriter Dean Lewis, who received a whopping five nods for his smash hit debut single Waves.

Since releasing Waves in September last year, Lewis has spent much of his time in Europe and America, signing deals and touring.

His single has already featured in the three American TV series including Suits and is set for a the kind of heavyweight label push which made Vance Joy a hit in the US.

He remains mystified as to why this song is the one to take him around the globe.

Newcomer Dean Lewis scored five ARIA Award nominations. Picture: Justin Lloyd.

“I would play it to my friends and family and they would all pick it as the song they loved and I knew when I wanted to listen to it 10 times in a row that it was a good song but you can’t predict success,” he said.

Lewis was often only one of a few Australian artists to make it onto the ARIA top 50 this year as streaming and lack of radio airplay support keeps our homegrown talent off the charts.

“It is weird when you look at the charts some weeks and there’s only three or four in the whole top 50,” he said.

“I don’t know what the secret is to it but it would great to have more Australians represented on the Australian charts.”

Hit Network announcer Ash London bravely called for radio stations to play more homegrown music.

“Australian music is the best in the world. It’s a pleasure to play it on the radio and we should all play more,” she said.

Illy and Vera Blue’s collaboration helped propel his Two Degrees album to huge success. Picture: Tim Hunter.

The late John Clarke was posthumously recognised for his unique and enduring contribution to Australia’s cultural landscape at the nominations event with the Best Comedy Release for his Clarke’s Classics collection.

The most prolific recording artists in Australia, the defiantly independent psychedelic rockers King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard not only scored a nomination in Best Hard Rock Album (Murder of the Universe) but Best Jazz Album (Sketches Of Brunswick East).

The 2017 ARIA Awards will be held at The Star on November 28 with organisers now courting international acts including Harry Styles to walk the red carpet and present a couple of awards.

You can vote for the public awards via ariaawards.com.au

And the nominees are ...

Apple Album Of The Year

A.B. Original, Reclaim Australia

Amy Shark, Night Thinker

Gang Of Youths, Go Farther In Lightness

Illy, Two Degrees

Paul Kelly, Life Is Fine

Best Male Artist

D.D Dumbo, Utopia Defeated

Dan Sultan, Killer

Illy, Two Degrees

Paul Kelly, Life Is Fine

Vance Joy, Lay It On Me

Best Female Artist

Amy Shark, Night Thinker

Jessica Mauboy, The Secret Daughter

Julia Jacklin, Don’t Let The Kids Win

Meg Mac, Low Blows

Sia, The Greatest feat. Kendrick Lamar

Best Dance Release

Dom Dolla & Torren Foot, Be Randy

Jagwar Ma, Every Now & Then

Peking Duk, Stranger (feat. Elliphant)

Pnau, Chameleon

The Kite String Tangle, The Kite String Tangle

Best Group

A.B. Original, Reclaim Australia

Gang Of Youths, Go Farther In Lightness

King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard, Flying Microtonal Banana

Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds, Skeleton Tree

Peking Duk, Stranger (feat. Elliphant)

Breakthrough Artist

A.B. Original, Reclaim Australia

Amy Shark, Night Thinker

Dean Lewis, Waves

Tash Sultana, Notion

Tkay Maidza, TKAY

Best Pop Release

Amy Shark, Night Thinker

Dean Lewis, Waves

Jessica Mauboy, Fallin

Sia, The Greatest (feat. Kendrick Lamar)

Vera Blue, Perennial

Best Urban Album

A.B. Original, Reclaim Australia

Illy, Two Degrees

REMI, Divas & Demons

Thundamentals, Everyone We Know

Tkay Maidza, TKAY

Best Independent Release

A.B. Original, Reclaim Australia

Dan Sultan, Killer

Sia, The Greatest (feat. Kendrick Lamar)

Tash Sultana, Notion

Vance Joy, Lay It On Me

Best Rock Album

Dan Sultan, Killer

Dune Rats, The Kids Will Know It’s Bullshit

Gang Of Youths, Go Farther In Lightness

Polish Club, Alrighty Alrighty

The Preatures, Girlhood

Best Adult Contemporary Album

Bernard Fanning, Brutal Dawn

D.D Dumbo, Utopia Defeated

Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds, Skeleton Tree

Paul Kelly, Life Is Fine

Pete Murray, Camacho

Best Country Album

Kasey Chambers, Dragonfly

Lee Kernaghan, The 25th Anniversary Album

O’Shea, 61-615

Shane Nicholson, Love And Blood

The McClymonts, Endless

Best Hard Rock/Heavy Metal Album

Airborne, Breaking Outta Hell

Frenzal Rhomb, Hi-Vis High Tea

King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard, Murder Of The Universe

Northlane, Mesmer

Sleepmakeswaves, Made of Breath Only

Best Blues & Roots Album

All Our Exes Live In Texas, When We Fall

Archie Roach, Let Love Rule

Busby Marou, Postcards From The Shell House

Paul Kelly & Charlie Owen, Death’s Dateless Night

Tash Sultana, Notion

Best Children’s Album

Jimmy Barnes, Och Aye the G’Nu!

Lah-Lah, Having Fun!

Peter Combe, Live It Up

The Idea of North, Lior & Elena Kats-Chernin, A Piece of Quiet [The Hush Collection, Vol 16]

The Wiggles, The Wiggles Duets

PUBLIC VOTED AWARDS

Best Video

Amy Shark, Drive You Mad

Bliss N Eso, Moments (feat. Gavin James)

Client Liaison, A Foreign Affair

Client Liaison, Off White Limousine

Dean Lewis for Waves

Gang Of Youths, The Deepest Signs, the Frankest Shadows

Illy, You Say When (feat. Marko Penn)

Jessica Mauboy, Fallin

Kirin J Callinan, S.A. D

Sia, The Greatest (feat. Kendrick Lamar)

Best Australian Live Act

Client Liaison

Flume

Gang Of Youths

Illy

Jessica Mauboy

King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizard

Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds

Peking Duk

Tash Sultana

Violent Soho

Apple Music Song Of The Year

Amy Shark, Adore

Bliss N Eso, Moments (feat. Gavin James)

Dean Lewis, Waves

Guy Sebastian, Set In Stone

Illy, Catch 22 (feat. Anne-Marie)

Jessica Mauboy, Fallin

Peking Duk, Stranger (feat. Elliphant)

Pnau, Chameleon

Sia, The Greatest (feat. Kendrick Lamar)

Starley, Call On Me (Ryan Riback Remix)

Best International Artist

Adele, 25

Bruno Mars, 24K Magic

Ed Sheeran, ÷ and Loose Change

Harry Styles, Harry Styles

Kendrick Lamar, DAMN and Untitled Unmastered

Lorde, Melodrama

Metallica, Hardwired ... To Self-Destruct

Shawn Mendes, Illuminate

The Rolling Stones, Blue & Lonesome

The Weeknd, Starboy

Originally published as Gang Of Youths, Paul Kelly, A.B. Originals, Amy Shark, Illy and Jess Mauboy lead ARIAs nominations