Japanese Breakfast, Wet Leg, Madlib Lead Winners at A2IM’s Indie Libera Awards
17.06.2022 - 18:03
/ variety.com
Jem Aswad Senior Music EditorJapanese Breakfast, Wet Leg and Madlib were among the top winners at the Libera Awards on Thursday night, the American Association of Independent Music’s annual awards ceremony.The event returned in a hybrid setting, with people from the indie community gathering at New York’s Webster Hall to receive awards, catch a DJ set from Madlib (featuring a freestyle from Talib Kweli) and live sets from Sammy Rae & the Friends and others, while concurrently a livestream of performances from Japanese Breakfast, Brittany Howard, Jason Isbell, Helado Negro and Cautious Clay was played in a separate room at the venue. Also performing live at the event were Tré Burt, Canadian Brass and Adrian Daniel.
Veteran DJ-producer-rapper Madlib received the Independent Icon honor, presented to him by longtime New York rapper Kweli. Japanese Breakfast swept the awards categories, taking home four awards for Record of the Year, Best Alternative Rock Record, Creative Packaging, and Marketing Genius for her album “Jubilee” (Dead Oceans).
British singer-songwriter Arlo Parks, who was last year’s Breakthrough Artist, won Best Pop Record for “Collapsed in Sunbeams” (Transgressive/[PIAS]). Britain’s Wet Leg were chosen as the 2022 Breakthrough Artist for their single “Chaise Longue” (Domino), which also garnered the Video of the Year award. Common was honored with the A2IM Humanitarian Award, while Bandcamp was celebrated as this year’s Independent Champion.The 2022 A2IM Libera Awards were presented by Merlin and sponsored by ADA, YouTube Music, Ingrooves, The Orchard, CLIO Music, edm.com, MSK (Mitchell, Silberberg & Knupp, LLP), Redeye Worldwide, Virgin Music, Artist Growth, EnterGain, SourceAudio, trac, and Luminate.Full
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