Events

VNZMAs - Still putting brown people in the ring?

Last night’s Vodafone NZ Music Awards saw many of our amazing Pacific artists take out awards in competitive categories. HUGE congrats to these artists on their contribution to New Zealand music. Here are our Pacific winners!

Kings - Breakthrough Artist of the Year

Sole Mio – Highest Selling album

Aaradhna – Best Female Solo Artist

Unity Pacific – Best Roots Album

SWIDT – Best Urban Hip Hop Album

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Kings with his Tui for Breakthrough artist of the Year

Now to touch on some of our observations from last night.

Best Urban/Hip Hop Album of 2016 – Won Initially by Aaradhna, re-awarded to SWIDT.

‘Urban’, what does this actually mean? Why was the only Hip Hop category paired with the word ‘Urban’? Hip Hop music in New Zealand is an explosive and creatively rich genre, that is more than capable of standing alone without this word. It’s also not hard to distinguish a Hip Hop artist from an RnB/Soul singer songwriter, so why all the confusion?

Aaradhna with her Tui for Best Female Solo Artist

The nominees for best “Urban/Hip Hop Album” were SWIDT, PNC and Aaradhna. Now lets get something straight, Aaradhna is not a hip-hop artist. As she said so eloquently last night, “I feel like if you’re putting a singer next to a hip-hop artist, it’s not fair. I’m a singer, I’m not a rapper, I’m not a hip-hop artist. It feels like I’ve been placed in the category of brown people.”

PNC on the red carpet

Following this, Aaradhna promptly re-awarded the prize to the SWIDT crew. “So right now I feel like I want to give this to a hip-hop artist, because I feel like this is the kind of award that is for a hip-hop artist. And I want to give it to SWIDT, because I believe that you guys are the future of hip-hop, if you guys keep going. I want to give this to you guys.”

SWIDT with their Tui (gifted by Aaradhna) for Best Urban Hip Hop Album

Where was the category for RnB/Soul music? Why was a massive genre so carelessly forgotten? AND, why is representation for Pacific music artists often undermined & undervalued? A great example is Russell Baillie’s write up ‘The Year in New Zealand Music’, where Aaradhna’s name was nowhere to be seen, despite being nominated for FOUR awards at the VNZMA’s. We spoke to Aaradhna and SWIDT’s manager Andy Murnane last night, here’s what he had to say: “When you’re in control of the media you have a position to tell the truth, you have a position to tell our achievements and represent our people the way they’re supposed to be represented.”

Aaradhna & manager Andy Murnane

We hope that future music events and awards in New Zealand will properly acknowlege our Pacific artists, so they can avoid being put into a box, or in this case, the wrong box.

Another mention goes to Unity Pacific for their Best Roots Album. A massive congrats to them, and although their acceptance speech was unjustly cut off from live tv, we tautoko all of their hard work and dedication to New Zealand music.

Pacific Unity with their Tui for Best Roots Album

We also want to say a huge ‘kalofae’ to the Offical VNZMA snapchat who confused the Koi Boys with Sole Mio. Don’t worry guys, we can tell the difference.

Fail VodafoneNZ!

Lastly, congratulations to Kings who won Breakthrough Artist of 2016. His vibrant live performance of 'Don’t Worry ‘Bout It' further proved why he took home that award. Here is some advice he has for upcoming artists trying to breakthrough, “Dream big, wake up and chase them. Surround yourself with good people. LOVE PEOPLE!”

Check out a few more pics from the night here:

Pacific Unity with Tiki Taane far left.

Big Runga with her Legacy Award acknowledging her 20 years in the NZ Music industry with Aaradhna backstage at the VNZMAs

Legendary NZ musician Dave Dobbyn with Aaradhna

For our pics from the Red Carpet check out our VNZMAs Red Carpet Facebook album here

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