Tame Impala’s Kevin Parker wins songwriter of the year at APRAs
Kevin Parker aka Tame Impala wins songwriter of the year at the 2021 APRA Music Awards, while Midnight Oil won the peer-voted song of the year award for Gadigal Land.
When Kevin Parker learned he would receive the top honour at the annual APRA Music Awards for excellence in Australian songwriting, his first thought was that they must have got the wrong guy.
“I always feel like the people that receive these kinds of honours are the high achievers, and I just don’t see myself as one of the high achievers in the music business,” he told The Australian.
His peers in the industry tend to disagree, however.
Better known as the creative force behind the Fremantle-based powerhouse rock/pop solo act Tame Impala, Parker was named songwriter of the year at a ceremony held in Sydney on Wednesday night.
Previously won by the likes of AC/DC brothers Angus and Malcolm Young, Sia, Hilltop Hoods and Gotye, the APRA songwriter of the year nod is only the latest in a string of accolades to follow the fourth Tame Impala album, The Slow Rush, which was released in February last year.
It also won five ARIA Awards late last year, including album of the year and best rock album.
Yet the week before the APRAs, Parker had turned back the clock to perform Tame Impala’s 2010 debut, InnerSpeaker, with his live bandmates for a global concert streamed from the coastal WA home studio where it had been recorded more than a decade earlier.
“I was a space cadet back then; I was stoned most of the time,” he said with a laugh. “I had dismissed my early stuff as not being ‘mature songwriting’; I didn’t have very many colours in my palette.
“But playing the whole album start to finish made me appreciate that I did know what I was doing — to some degree,” Parker said.
And as Parker opened his mind to a broader palette, Tame Impala’s global popularity has risen to the point where it now headlines the world’s biggest festivals, and the rewards have only piled up in turn.
“When you’re starting out, you worry that if you use all the colours, they’ll all mix together and make beige — but that’s not the case at all,” he said.
Hosted by the Australasian music rights management organisation APRA AMCOS, the event on Wednesday saw the award for peer-voted song of the year go to Midnight Oil’s Rob Hirst for Gadigal Land, the Sydney rock band’s first single in 17 years, which was co-written with Joel Davison and Bunna Lawrie.
Breakthrough songwriter of the year was 17-year-old First Nations hip-hop artist The Kid Laroi, while pop singer-songwriter Toni Watson — aka Tones and I — won most performed pop work and most performed Australian work for her single Never Seen the Rain.
2021 APRA Music Award winners:
Songwriter of the year: Kevin Parker aka Tame Impala
Peer-voted APRA song of the year: Gadigal Land by Midnight Oil
Breakthrough songwriter of the year: The Kid Laroi aka Charlton Howard
Ted Albert award for outstanding services to Australian music:Joy McKean
Most performed Australian work: Never Seen the Rain by Tones and I aka Toni Watson
Most performed alternative work: Live in Life by The Rubens
Most performed blues & roots work: Over Drinking Over You by Busby Marou
Most performed country work: Diamonds by Morgan Evans
Most performed dance work: Rushing Back by Flume featuring Vera Blue
Most performed hip-hop/rap work: Misunderstood by Youngn Lipz
Most performed R&B/soul work: Rain by The Teskey Brothers
Most performed pop work: Never Seen the Rain by Tones and I aka Toni Watson
Most performed rock work: Getting the Band Back Together by Cold Chisel
Most performed Australian work overseas: Be Alright by Dean Lewis
Most performed international work: Don’t Start Now by Dua Lipa
Note: The 2021 APRA Music Awards nominees and subsequent winners are determined by performance activity as reflected by earnings between 1st October 2019 to 30th September 2020
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