For the first time ever females have out numbered males in the shortlist for the Australian Music Prize (AMP). The finalists were announced today with Sarah Blasko, Oh Mercy, Kid Sam, Lucie Thorne, Bertie Blackman, The Mess Hall, Urthboy, Black Cab and Australian Idol contestant Lisa Mitchell all making the cut. More “successful” acts including Powderfinger, Wolfmother and the Temper Trap weren’t so lucky.
The prize is generally regarded as the most prestigious music prize in Australia, probably due to the fact that there are no record company or management figures on the select juding panel, and that record sales aren’t a deciding factor. It is also the most lucrative, with a $30,000 prize for the winner and a $15,000 prize for the artist picked as having ‘outstanding potential’.
We don’t have anything against men with guitars but the awards have been dominated by male rock n roll bands in the past, with previous winners including The Drones, The Mess Hall and Eddy Current Suppression Ring. Last year Bernard Zuel, music critic and AMP judge, was quoted as saying: ”Who is afraid of pop music? Of hip-hop, electronica and the avant-garde? And, most particularly, of women?”
Well Zuel, it seems we’ve overcome our fears (or at least the Australian Music Industry has) with a healthy dose of female singer song writers and one Aussie hip hopper. The winner will be announced on March 12.
