AIM-ing for credibility

Anugerah Industri Muzik aims to be more transparent in its judging process this year, writes Nur Aqidah Azizi

FROM the elimination of major album categories to the retraction of Yuna’s award in the much-coveted Best Song award for her single Penakut, last year’s Anugerah Industri Muzik (AIM) 18 saw some loss of credibility for the awards show.

The controversies surrounding the prestigious event didn’t only receive a backlash from the media, local music fraternities also voiced their dissatisfaction, especially regarding the judging process.

Recording Industry Association of Malaysia (RIM) co-chairman Rosmin Hashim said this year’s AIM, its 19th, will have a panel of  expert judges, comprising eminent practitioners from the local music industry. “The process will be presided by a chief judge. The management and administration of the judging process will be handled by Macomm Management Services, an independent professional firm which has previously overseen the administration of the 4A’s Kancil Awards, Malaysian Effie Awards and Malaysian Media Awards,” said Rosmin.

A new judging auditor, KPMG, has also been selected by RIM.

The previous practice of judging and selection saw the inclusion of judges, not only from industry players, but also from media, radio, television and recording labels.

“From a forum we held recently, we received a lot of feedback from the artistes who expressed their dissatisfaction with the judging process. They feel that it is better for their work to be judged by people from the industry,” he said.

“We respect all feedback with regards to AIM. We are making best efforts to restore the credibility of the awards show,” he said at  a press conference, which was also attended by Astro vice-president for Malay language business, Khairul Anwar Salleh.

Rosmin added the judges this year include music composers, lyricists, album producers as well as individuals who are well versed with the music industry.

On whether the new judging system will result in biased decisions due to conflict of interest among the judges, Rosmin said, the AIM committee will ensure that such circumstances will not happen. “We have looked into the matter and judges whose works may be competing in AIM19 will be exempted during the judging process,” he said.

The list of judges will also be revealed this year, after the announcement of Top five finalists for AIM 19.

The awards show will be held on Nov 17 at Stadium Melawati Shah Alam. It will be televised live on Astro Ria (channel 104).

This year’s nominations are open to songs and albums in the Malay and English languages that were released in Malaysia from July 1, 2011 to June 30, 2012.

Nominations for AIM 19 will close on Aug 15 at 5pm.

AIM 19 will see competition in 19 categories, including Best New Artiste, Best Vocal Performance In A Song (Male), Best Vocal Performance in A Song (Female), Best Group Vocal Performance In A Song, Best Album Cover, Best

Engineered Album, Best Music Video, Best Ethnic Pop Song, Best Nasyid Song, Best Rock Song, Best Pop Song, Best Hip Hop Song, Best Local English Song, Best Malay Song Performed By A Foreign Artiste, Kembara Award,

Outstanding Achievement Award, Best Musical Arrangement In A Song, Song Of The Year and Album of the Year.

Unlike last year, AIM 19 is accepting nominations from the English language repertoire for the Best Hip Hop Song category.

“We understand the hip hop genre is plentiful in the English language. We have a lot of local English hip hop products and we want them to compete in AIM’s platform,” said Rosmin.

AIM is also planning to hold two separate annual AIM Award events to recognise local music recordings and achievements in Chinese and Indian languages. “This is a part of our objectives to further drive the local music industry.

Details of the events will be announced soon,” said Rosmin.

At the same time, songs in other dialects are also welcome to take part in AIM this year, in the Best Ethnic Pop Song category.

“We hope to see more ethnic songs, such as from Kelantan, Sabah and Sarawak.”

Khairul (left) and Rosmin pose with AIM 19 awards. Picture by Halimaton Saadiah Sulaiman

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