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Drunk commentary, LGBT activism and Johnny Farnham: the 6 most memorable moments from the 2016 ARIAs

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by Happy

H

by Happy

This year’s ARIA Awards was a night filled with charm, crisis and wonderful cringe moments. Over the past few days the internet has been a flurry of post-ARIA commentaries, award backlashes and praise for one of the most political-charged ARIA event in history. Like a net, we caught all the action and we thought we’d share the most memorable moments for you in one place. Now we can all move on. Till next year, ARIAs.

2016 arias

Drunk commentary, LGBT activism and Johnny Farnham. We look back at the 6 most memorable moments from the 2016 ARIAs.

Ball Park Music’s Boozed Twitter Commentary

With public announcements to the tune of “Need to piss” and “Our manager is so bored he’s sexting”, the Ball Park gang delivered their tell-it-like-it-is frankness we’ve all come to know and love through their lyrics.  The Best Rock Album nominees may have lost the ARIA game this year, but won over the Twittersphere with their hilarious drunken truth bombs.

James Tidswell from Violent Soho Losing His Shit to John Farnham Performing You’re the Voice

There’s nothing that quite gets the blood pumping like Johnny Farnham’s You’re the Voice. It’s the go-to end-of-the-night anthem for drunken Australians around the country and has been for the last 30 years. It’s also apparently a personal favourite for Violent Soho guitarist James Tidswell. Farnham wrapped up the ARIAs this year with a belting rendition of his 1986 classic to the collective shit-losing of the Australian music industry, which included Tidswell getting all anthemic when the chorus hits. Keep an eye out for the long-haired guy in the green shirt below.

Queen Kylie’s Surprise Appearance With an Activist Edge

Sporting her “Say I Do Down Under” t-shirt, standing alongside fiancée Joshua Sasse, Kylie Minogue used her stage time to speak about a cause close to her heart: marriage equality. In a quest to make 2017 the year Australia passes same-sex marriage legislation, the engaged couple passionately advocated for the rights of the LGBT community, and we thought it ruled.

Montaigne’s Awkwardly Adorable Acceptance Speech

Montaigne delivered a gloriously confusing acceptance speech for her Breakthrough Artist award. After referring to her ARIA as a “pointy spear of recognition”, she attempted to explain the philosophical teachings of the ‘real Montaigne’ – a French philosopher. This was when things started to fall off the wagon. After mumbling her way through the ‘real Montaigne’s’ philosophical ethos, she continued, “I must remember that for the rest of my life I will probably eject at least three loads out of my butt every week …like a million other humans at the same time.” Although it confused plenty of viewers, we got the general gist of what she was trying to say, and we dug it.

Metalheads Getting All Shitty about King Gizzard Taking Home the ARIA for Best Hard Rock/Heavy Metal Release

Australia’s heavy music community weren’t too stoked about King Gizzard taking home the ARIA for Best Hard Rock/Heavy Metal release for Nonagon Infinity. Many took to Twitter right after the award was announced to vent their frustration/disbelief:

There was also some backlash from fellow nominees – which included Parkway Drive, Twelve Foot Ninja and The Amity Affliction – who spoke publicly about their disapproval of the outcome. Twelve Foot Ninja guitarist Stevic MacKay spoke to Music Feeds about what he thought was poor judgement from the ARIAs:

“I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t irritated by the only band who shouldn’t have been in the category actually winning,” he said. “If any other band in the category had won, it would have made sense.”

He continued: “King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard had great year but they are not a hard rock/ metal band so it feels like the category was discredited somewhat by the outcome.”

Parkway Drive’s manager made a similar statement to Music Feeds.

“Unfortunately I don’t have too much to say about the situation other then its odd that a band wins a category in which they aren’t ‘Hard Rock or Heavy Metal’,” Resist Records’ Graham Nixon said. “Between the success of both Parkway Drive and The Amity Affliction, it’s surprising one of those didn’t do enough to win that specific category.”

Amity Affliction bassist Ahren Stringer shadowed similar sentiments on his Twitter account:

As did Amity Affliction guitarist Joel Birch:

King Gizzard have made no official comment about the win. They’re probably too busy, you know, getting on with their insanely hectic lives.

Violent Soho Almost Missing Their Second Award Announcement Because They Were Boozing In Celebration of Their First

Violent Soho took out two awards at the ARIAs this year; one for Best Rock Album and one for Best Group. They almost missed out on picking up the latter though. Why, you ask? Because they were too busy downstairs drinking beers in celebration of winning the former. Instead, I OH YOU’s Johann Ponniah had to fill in for them alongside the band’s girlfriends/wives until they got their shit together. “We were just downstairs having beers, we thought we were finished,” they said when they finally made it to the stage. They then proceeded to tear through a rendition of Like Soda from their ARIA-winning WACO.

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