Gotye — aka Melbourne artist Wally De Backer — and Wagons dominated the 2011 Age EG Awards at the Prince Bandroom, in a spectacular night of rock ‘n’ roll featuring blistering sets from 2011 EG Hall of Fame inductees Hoodoo Gurus, sister sensations Stonefield, and the EG Allstars band.
Gotye scooped three trophies, including best male, song of the year for Somebody That I Used to Knowfeaturing Kimbra and a new award presented by Music Victoria for achievement of the year in recognitionof Gotye’s outstanding chart success, at one point actually nudging Adele out of top spot on the ARIA chart.Wagons took out best band and best album for Rumble, Shake & Tumble. With the band’s eponymousleader Henry Wagons touring interstate, band members Si Francis, Mark Dawson and Chad Masongleefully accepted the awards (and took the opportunity to get a few words in, in the absence of their talkativefrontman).
Arguably the most stirring award of the night, however, went to Triple R stalwart Stephen ‘The Ghost’Walker. Walker was the first non musician inducted into EG Steve Waldon Hall of Fame in recognition of his 30 year involvement at Triple R as an annoncer and programmer.
Other winners on the night were Clare Bowditch for best female, Dave Graney & the Lurid YellowMist were named best Victorian band, Sydney’s garage rockers Royal Headache scored best new talentand best tour went to Roundhouse and Frontier Touring for Blondie and the Pretenders at thePalais Theatre.
There were 81904 votes cast across the eight reader- voted categories this year, making these the largest public voted awards in Australia.
