Shark, Minchin, Oils vie for song of the year at 2021 APRA Awards
Nominees for song of the year at the 2021 APRA Music Awards include Amy Shark, Tim Minchin, Midnight Oil, Guy Sebastian and Tame Impala.
For the fourth time in five years, Amy Shark has been nominated by her musical peers in the song of the year category at the annual celebration of excellence in contemporary songwriting.
The APRA Music Awards will be held next month, and Shark’s single Everybody Rise – co-written with Joel Little – is a contender in the same category that she won in 2019 for her song I Said Hi.
“I had so many years of not feeling accepted, and not feeling seen,” she told The Australian. “You know how you go through some years at school where you don’t really know where you sit? When I’m at the APRAs, I’m with my people.”
“I’m around songwriters; we all love this so much, and we all get each other,” said Shark, whose song is also nominated for most performed pop work. “We’re all addicted to this one particular thing, and it’s cool to be in that room with that sort of energy.”
Shark’s rivals include Tim Minchin for his song Carry You, performed by Missy Higgins; Rob Hirst of Midnight Oil for Gadigal Land, the Sydney rock band’s first single in 17 years, co-written with Bunna Lawrie and poet Joel Davison; Guy Sebastian for Standing With You, co-written with Jamie Hartman and Greg Holden; and Tame Impala aka Kevin Parker for Lost In Yesterday.
For Fremantle musician Parker, the nomination marks the chance for Tame Impala’s third career win in the top song category, having previously won in 2013 and 2016.
Last year’s APRA Music Awards were streamed online as a virtual event, where Tones and I aka Toni Watson won song of the year and breakthrough songwriter of the year for her global smash hit Dance Monkey.
Artists nominated for the breakthrough songwriter category this year include Lime Cordiale, aka brothers Oli and Louis Leimbach; Thelma Plum, Mallrat aka Grace Shaw, Miiesha aka Miiesha Young and The Kid Laroi, aka 17 year-old Los Angeles-based hip-hop performer Charlton Howard.
In the most performed Australian work category, Watson is nominated for her song Never Seen the Rain, alongside The Rubens (for Live in Life), Flume featuring Vera Blue (Rushing Back), Martin Garrix & Dean Lewis (Used to Love) and Dua Lipa (Break My Heart).
Of these five nominations, the latter is the most curious: Lipa is a 25 year-old British pop singer-songwriter, but during the creation of Break My Heart, she and her collaborators eventually realised that it contained an unintentional similarity to the distinctive riff that propels the 1987 INXS hit Need You Tonight.
Rather than risk a copyright lawsuit, Lipa and her co-writers smartly gave INXS band members Andrew Farriss and Michael Hutchence publishing and songwriting credits on the song, which is why it’s now nominated at an Australian awards ceremony.
“It was a funny moment when we were like, ‘Eureka!’ And then, ‘Oh, wait a second…’” Lipa told Billboard last year. “I’m not trying to get sued, is kind of the moral of the story.”
The upcoming 39th APRA Music Awards will return as a live event to be held at Sydney’s International Convention Centre on Wednesday, April 28.
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