The 12th Drum&Bass Arena Awards 2020 took place in an exclusive online ceremony on Wednesday evening, much in line with the new normal of this year and following the recent trend of other most award shows, music events and live performance being held via special virtual streams. Hosted by renowned d&b vocallist Jenna G and UKF editor Dave Jenkins, and filmed by The Halley, the event looked back at all memorable releases of the past year and picked the best from a diverse scene with so much emerging talent and established names still going strong. As DJ Ollie pointed out for Love That Bass “awards in this scene are always controversial, everyone always has an opinion” but the show did a great job in highlighting the best moments of 2020.
In a thorough overview of the ceremony, the leading electronic label and promoted UKF rightfuly states that the results “reflect resilience, talent and innovation this year, and the awards try to show respect to this as much as possible. No single ceremony can congratulate all those worthy in the scene, but the Drum&BassArena Awards certainly does its best to celebrate as many talented individuals as possible” The full ceremony alongside all interviews and acceptance videos can be seen on the YouTube video bellow.
As stated in the official Drum&Bass Arena Awards’ website, all winners have been exclusively selected by electronic public votes, with the exception of the Hall of Fame Award given by fellow DJs and industry professionals, and the Critics Choice Award chosen by bloggers and writers. As usual, the awards were heavily dominated by British producers, with few international honorary mentions such as the Australian drum’n’bass giants Pendulum who won their first ever prize for Best Live Stream for their live performance at Spitbank Fort back in October, and then followed it by also winning the Best Track award for their killer comeback ‘Driver‘ from September 2020.
Without any surprises, the biggest winner of the night was the renowned London independent label Hospital Records who won the Best Label award for seventh consecutive year and also claimed the Best Event for their Hospitality series across the UK. Three members of their extensive current roster also managed to claim prizes for their individual accomplishments, with Metrik winning the prestigious award for Best Producer, Inja being voted as Best MC and the Brazillian DJ S.P.Y going home with the prize for Best Remix for his re-work of ‘You Got Me‘ by Kings Of The Rollers, also signed for Hospital Records.
Huge congratulations to @MetrikMusic, @injamusic, @KOTRTWEETS and @SPYDNB for being recognized for their wonderful work this year, and thank you so much for voting for us, to all of our fans across the world and to @OfficialDnBA pic.twitter.com/3CnMTIJPEk
— Hospital Records (@HospitalRecords) December 10, 2020
In the other categories voted by the general public, Alex Mark Calvert knows as A.M.C was honoured as Best DJ following a productive 2020 and praised worldwide by for the likes of Insomniac for “his attention to detail, technical articulation and patience paying off more and more with every year“. Best Newcomer for the last year was the rising Dutch producer Waeys who dropped his EP Objection via Overview Music, while the Best Newcomer Label was the Bristol-based Sofa Sound. Dutch heavyweights Noisia’s very own Noisia Radio was selected as Best Podcast.
With regards to full studio records, the main award for Best Album went to British d’n’b/jungle DJ Shy FX’ Raggamuffin Reloaded, a remix compilation of his critically acclaimed Raggamuffin Soundtape (2019), beating Metrik’s Ex Machina and Alix Perez’ Without End. Halogenix’ EP Dragon Force was chosen for Best Artwork, courtesy of Bertie Simpson. Last but not least, Katie Boyle from the leading drum’n’base duo Koven deservedly snatched the prize for Best Vocallist following her versatile vocal display in Butterfly Effect (2020).
For the two industry-selected rewards, Jumpin Jack Frost was honoured with the Hall of Fame reward while Doc Scott won the Critics’ Choice Award on the 12th Drum&Bass Arena Awards.
