Melbourne’s powerhouse punk outfit, Amyl and The Sniffers mark another chapter in their meteoric rise taking home four wins at the 2025 ARIA Awards for ‘Album Of The Year’, ‘Best Cover Art’, ‘Best Rock Album’, ‘Best Group’, for their highly-acclaimed album, Cartoon Darkness. The band were up for a total of six nominations including ‘Best Video’ and ‘Best Australian Live Act’.
The win follows a huge week kicking off their support slot for AC/DC’s PWR UP 2025 Tour, GRAMMY-Award Nomination (‘Best Rock Performance’), 2025 Double J Australian Artist of the Year, and turning a cancelled hometown show at Fed Square into a spontaneous celebration across seven venues in Melbourne’s live-music hub.
A free, all-ages show at Melbourne’s Federation Square was due to kick off from on Friday 14 November, where 10,000 locals gathered, but unfortunately, due to the crowd pressure and fallen perimeter fences, organisers were forced to cancel the event minutes before they started due to safety breaches. Instead of a bitter ending, the band didn’t want to leave their fans disappointed, so they instead turned their performance fee into $35,000 in bar tabs, shared across seven grassroots venues. “Have a drink on us,” declared front-woman Amy Taylor.
“Cartoon Darkness is driving headfirst into the unknown, into this looming sketch of the future that feels terrible, but doesn’t even exist yet. A childlike darkness. I don’t want to meet the devil half-way and mourn what we have right now. The future is cartoon, the prescription is dark, but it’s novelty. It’s just a joke. It’s fun.”
Amy Taylor, Amyl and The Sniffers
Cartoon Darkness has seen a sweep of recognition, debuting at #2 on the ARIA Chart, nominated last year at the 2024 J Awards for Australian Album of The Year, 2024 Australian Music Prize, Winner of Best LP/EP, Best Live Act, at the Rolling Stone Awards 2025, was also hailed triple j’s Feature Album alongside recognition across community radio.
The band has been busy touring non-stop, playing Sidney Myer Music Bowl, and reaching global stages across US/UK/EU. Most recently the band had one of their biggest shows in London at Alexandra Palace, as well as opening for acts such as Turnstile, Fontaines D.C & Kneecap @ Finsbury Park, Foo Fighters, and gracing the stage at international festivals Coachella, Glastonbury, Leeds & Reading Festival, and more.
Congrats to Amyl and The Sniffers and all the amazing artists this year, and to everyone who has put so much passion and energy into our artists’ releases!