AIR Awards 2010 Nominees

There was a time when Australian indie music was the exception — now it's the rule, which can only be a good thing for our ever-impressive national talent pool, as this selection of AIR 2010 nominees confirms. The standout artists for this year, based on volume of nominations (three apiece), are Sia ("Clap Your Hands") whose breezy, upbeat fourth album We Are Born marked a career-so-far high, Dan Sultan, whose country-soul brand of rock 'n' roll lends a propulsive energy to tracks like "Fear of Flying," and Cloud Control whose challenge for the Breakthrough Independent Artist gong rests on excellent tracks like "There's Nothing in the Water We Can't Fight." Roots and hip-hop contenders rub shoulders among our AIR 2010 Next Steps.

The generic scope of the AIR Awards means that, aside from the coveted Best Independent Album overall prize, there's a host of more specifically zoned honours up for grabs — the Blues and Roots category, for example, takes in the finely layered reggae and party dub vibe of Melbourne's the Red Eyes ("Soul's Almighty") as well as the primal, stripped-back, hand-clapped soul of Mama Kin ("Beat and Holler"). The Hip-Hop/Urban slot, meanwhile, pulls in a couple of loose splinters associated with the Herd: Sydney MC Ozi Batla, who makes his solo debut with Wild Colonial, and Urthboy, here recruiting Jane Tyrell for the easy-groovin' "Shruggin." Kasey Chambers meets the Amity Affliction, in Deep Cuts.

The final section of our AIR 2010 selection gets underway with a taste o' country, courtesy of Amber Lawrence, who kicks up some boot-heel dust with "Women Like Me (Don't Like Girls Like You)," the Sunny Cowgirls, who grew up on a farm in Hamilton and live up to their name with "Summer," and Kasey Chambers, who hooks up with her dad (Poppa Bill) for a family friendly album project that features "The Lost Music Blues," with its fiddle-playing emu, kazoo-blowing wombat and bongo-banging dingo. You might want to proceed with caution as the Amity Affliction drops its post-hardcore "Anchors," so stand by with some mellow jazz from the Allan Browne Quintet ("If Memory Serves").

Hosted by the Australian Independent Record Labels Association, the AIR Awards are a celebration of the best in Aussie indie music — and here "indie" is taken to stipulate that the master recordings are not owned by major labels, and that distribution follows an independent Australian-owned model. The City of Melbourne hosts the 2010 shindig, which features many established bands who have most likely found their way onto your list of favourites already, and a few newbies who are destined to end up there. A couple of Dans (Kelly and Sultan) join British India among the artists with a shot at Best Independent Artist glory, the late Rowland S. Howard gets a posthumous nod for his solo release Pop Crimes, and the rest of the card is filled out by outfits as diverse as the Alister Spence Trio and 50 Lions. No doubt about it — this is an outstanding year.