The hosts, nominees and top five for Peer-Voted APRA Song of the Year have been announced for the centenary edition of the 2026 APRA Music Awards, to be held on Wednesday, April 29 at Sydney’s Hordern Pavilion.
This year’s Song of the Year top five features three previous winners from across the musical spectrum. 2025 winners Amyl and the Sniffers are nominated for the playfully controversial Jerkin’, which is also up for Most Performed Rock Work; multi-award-winner Paul Kelly, with nephew and first-time nominee Dan Kelly, for Rita Wrote A Letter, the long-awaited follow up to How to Make Gravy; and two-time-winner Kevin Parker for Tame Impala’s slacker-rock hit Loser.
Heavy music is again being recognised at this years awards, with the keenly sought after Most Performed Hard Rock/Heavy Metal Work a feature of the nnight. This years nominess are The Amity Affliction, Thornhill, Ocean Grove, Parkway Drive and Make Them Suffer. HEAVY sent out short Q & A’s to all bands, with todays focus being Ocean Grove. Questions answered by bass player Twiggy Hunter.
Title: RAINDROP
Artist: Ocean Grove
Written by: Samuel Bassal / Brent Hunter / Luke Holmes
Published by: BMG
HEAVY: You are one of five nominees for the 2026 Most Performed Hard Rock/Heavy Metal Work APRA Music Award. What does it mean for your band to be nominated?
TWIGGY: It’s an honour to have one of our works nominated for the APRA award. We put a tonne of time and energy into touring and performing our songs, so, to be recognised for this award really brings it all home and makes it all feel worth it.
HEAVY: The hard rock/metal category is still relatively new. How important is it to the Australian music industry, and especially bands from these genres to have this recognition?
TWIGGY: Hard rock/metal finally gaining recognition is a huge deal for the Aussie scene. Australian rock/metal bands work incredibly hard, take so much risk and put it all on the line. Living in Australia means we have to fly and travel great distance to capture audience that a lot of internationals can capture with ease geologically. The rock/metal community in Australia is cut from a different cloth – for Aussie bands, touring can be brutal. In this day and age it’s a serious hustle unless you happen to just ‘click’ or catch onto/create a viral wave. I have a deep respect for Aussie bands and artists who put it all on the line for what they believe in and for a lot of us, writing, touring and performing our art is everything we know.
HEAVY: This year celebrates 100 years of APRA. Where do you see Australian hard rock and heavy metal in 10 years?
TWIGGY: Hopefully a lot bigger than it already is. You can definitely smell something in the air as of late. Aussie rock/metal has had a great resurgence over the past 5 years and it seems to be growing so I’d love to see OG and a lot of other solid Aussie acts gain recognition over the coming years.
HEAVY: If you had to pick one band nominated other than yourself to win the Most Performed Hard Rock/Heavy Metal Work Award, who would it be and why?
TWIGGY: Our best mates Thornhill have been nominated so they’d be top choice for sure. Our drummer/producer Sammy B has actually been nominated twice having worked on both OG and Thornhill songs as well as mixing for The Amity Affliction who are also nominated. I’m rooting for either of us three to win the award so I can celebrate the win with our mates.
HEAVY: Will you have a speech prepared or are you planning to wing it if your name gets called out on the night?
TWIGGY: There is always a lot to say but we don’t wanna give em a sob story. We’ll probably give a cheers to those who believed in us and get on our horse!
HEAVY: What’s the rest of 2026 look like for your band?
TWIGGY: We just finished a 6 week long UK/EU tour with POPPY so it’s good to be home for a minute. We have a few months off – Sam and I will be doing some writing soon which I’m looking forward to. We have an Australian headline tour in the works and potentially another US run in October/November which is yet to be confirmed. Priority is new music and actually having some time off to catch our breath as we’ve been touring non-stop. It’s important to have a breather and to find your feet comin out of the chaos that comes with touring.
