The view from the nosebleeds. (Image: Alex Casey)<\/p>\n
That was just the first of many triumphant wins witnessed over the course of the night, which also included \u2018Kei Whati Te Marama\u2019 winning the Maioha award, and Mahuia Bridgman-Cooper winning best original music in a series for The Gone S2. Beloved country act The Warratahs were inducted into the New Zealand music hall of fame, and Marlon Williams and KOMMI won the big prize of the night for \u2018Aua Atu R\u0101\u2019. The rest of us won something too \u2013 small boxes of chicken and chips with a curiously spicy sauce were handed around at halftime and enjoyed by everyone from Paul Goldsmith to Bic Runga.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Beyond the big gongs, here\u2019s everything else you might have missed from a raucous night at the Silver Scrolls.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The night was \u014ctautahi strong<\/p>\n
It wasn\u2019t just because the city was hosting this year \u2013 \u014ctautahi was all over the ceremony like sauce on $2 rice. Three out of the five Silver Scroll nominees were Canterbury strong (Marlon Williams, Fazerdaze, There\u2019s a Tuesday) and dozens of local musicians popped up to perform including Ben Woods, Holly Arrowsmith, Ryan Chin and Phoebe Vic. Hosts Stacey Morrison and Jed Parsons, both from \u014ctautahi, paid homage to the tight-knit community throughout. \u201cI\u2019m not saying we\u2019re interbred,\u201d said Morrison. \u201cBut when I found out I was working with Jed, of course my cousin says \u2018oh yeah, I went out with his brother\u2019.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Jed Parsons and Stacey Morrison. (Image: Supplied)<\/p>\n
There was an extremely mild roast of the artists<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s a Tuesday?\u201d said Parsons. \u201cThere\u2019s heaps actually \u2013 one every single week.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
There were many thrilling looks<\/p>\n
I could talk about the bold primary colours that leapt out of the mostly black-clad crowd, like Music 101 host Kara Rickard\u2019s brick red power suit, or alt pop star Emily Browning\u2019s electric blue, yellow and red bow ensemble, or Tiki Taane\u2019s resplendent ruby waistcoat. I could also talk about the autumnal tones as seen in Anthonie Tonnon\u2019s olive green turtleneck, Bic Runga\u2019s caramel two piece, or Marlon Williams in head-to-toe forest green.\u00a0<\/p>\n
All these classy colour moments, and yet nothing beats Anika Moa and her turquoise Crocs. \u201cWe\u2019ve got an incredible security guard here tonight, she\u2019s wearing Crocs and her name is Anika Moa,\u201d said Morrison. At half time, I found Moa in the foyer and snapped a pic of them in all their glory. \u201cOnce you turn 40 you stop giving a fuck,\u201d said Moa.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Chicken and chips and Anika Moa in Crocs. (Images: Alex Casey)<\/p>\n
Wilhelm scream < Devlin yell\u00a0<\/p>\n
A couple of times over the course of the evening, the hosts had to fill time while they sorted out the stage behind the curtain for the next performance. These moments brought about impromptu crowd singalongs of \u2018Not Many\u2019 and an extremely off key rendition of \u2018Bathe in the the River\u2019, but the best of all of these padding improvisations came early on. When Parsons noted that Callum Devlin of Hans Puckett, The Weed Eaters and the now-infamous Music Awards Yelling<\/a> was sitting in the crowd, he demanded another guttural howl be set free. Devlin obliged, perhaps doubling his duration on the last one, and soon we were all yelling up the heavens together. Still sounded better than \u2018Bathe in the River\u2019 tbh.\u00a0<\/p>\n There were buzzy musical arrangements<\/p>\n As is tradition for the Silver Scrolls, all the songs nominated for the top prize were reimagined by fellow artists throughout the course of the night, with this year\u2019s lineup overseen by music director Delaney Davidson. Memorable moments included the roof nearly flying off when the potent quartet of Ria Hall, Tami Neilson, Phoebe Vic and Tusekah belted Jess B\u2019s \u2018Power\u2019, a rapping Julia Deans pairing up with MC Tali on Mazbou Q\u2019s \u2018Torque\u2019 and a deeply abstracted rendition of There\u2019s a Tuesday\u2019s \u2018Margo\u2019 featuring Paul Ubana Jones. It was a bit like Triple J\u2019s Like a Version, except if everyone had taken the pill that Bradley Cooper took in Limitless.<\/p>\n Poli-poli-poli-politicians<\/p>\n With so many politicians in the house (Paul Goldsmith, Chl\u00f6e Swarbrick, Steve Abel, Duncan Webb, Rueben Davidson) there were a fair few \u2013 ahem \u2013 shout outs during speeches. An early \u201cboo\u201d from the darkness at the first mention of Goldsmith and an enormous cheer for Swarbrick soon got a gentle growling from Stacey Morrison (\u201cwe\u2019re not biased here\u201d), but it was clear the horse had already bolted. \u201cGod bless governments that support the arts,\u201d Tami Neilson said at one point, making a winky sign of the cross. \u201cTo the arts and culture minister, much love,\u201d said Marlon Williams, who revealed he had once sent an angry email to Goldsmith, who previously worked for the Waitangi Tribunal. \u201cYou\u2019ve done a lot of incredible work for M\u0101ori \u2013 a while ago. That\u2019s why I know you\u2019ve got a conscience and that you can turn things around from within.\u201d<\/p>\n The Warratahs became hall of famers<\/p>\n Tami Neilsen did the honours of inducting The Warratahs into the hall of fame, sharing what a revelation it was to hear \u2018Hands of My Heart\u2019 when she first arrived in Aotearoa and wondered where all the country artists singing about this country were. \u201cMy heart almost burst as the feeling of kinship washed over me, I finally found my ragtag country songwriter kinfolk,\u201d she said, acknowledging that the Warratahs \u201cbuilt the foundations that we all stand on today.\u201d An excellent video package wrapped up their decades-long legacy, featuring insights from fans such as Mel Parsons, Marlon Williams, and Katie Thompson, but sadly made no mention of the greatest New Zealand jingle of all time<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u2018Temu Tami Neilson\u2019 and Tiki Taane brought the house down<\/p>\n To borrow a wrestling term, the biggest pops of the night came from Hannah Darroch from SOUNZ, who referred to herself as the \u2018Temu Tami Neilson\u2019 because her fringe was less voluminous. Before presenting the contemporary award to Ihlara McIndoe for \u2018Of Coral And Foam\u2019, Darroch posited a thought experiment. \u201cImagine an Aotearoa where the hard work, resilience and dedication of musicians is seen in parallel to the dedication and high level skill required of all sports people,\u201d she said to rapturous applause. <\/p>\n \u201cImagine an Aotearoa where music and the arts are embedded into the education system.\u201d<\/p>\n Another big moment came for Tiki Taane after he won with Arli Liberman for Best Original Music on Ka Whawhai Tonu. \u201cMyself and many of the cast and crew on Ka Whawhai Tonu are direct descendants of those that fought in the battle of \u014cr\u0101kau in 1864. We are here and exist because of their bravery and their courage,\u201d he said. \u201cThat was 161 years ago, and even though today the battlefields have changed, we\u2019re still fighting.\u201d <\/p>\n He ended his speech with a plea to the room: \u201cI see so much power here \u2013 you can use your music, your voice, your messages, to change and affect the consciousness of this planet.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The big night honouring the best in New Zealand songwriting took place in \u014ctautahi last night. Alex Casey…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":111362,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[79688,492,156,79689,79690,111,139,69,49184,1066,79691],"class_list":{"0":"post-111361","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-entertainment","8":"tag-apra","9":"tag-comments-enabled","10":"tag-entertainment","11":"tag-local-music","12":"tag-marlon-williams","13":"tag-new-zealand","14":"tag-newzealand","15":"tag-nz","16":"tag-nz-music","17":"tag-pop-culture","18":"tag-silver-scrolls"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/111361","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=111361"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/111361\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/111362"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=111361"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=111361"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=111361"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Ria Hall, Phoebe Vic, Tusekah and Tami Neilson cover \u2018Power\u2019. (Image: Supplied)<\/p>\n
The Warratahs are inducted into the Music Hall of Fame. Image: Supplied<\/p>\n