Anyone who’d rather spend Halloween finding a new favourite band than a costume has a plan now. The 17th Golden Indie Music Awards (GIMA) goes live from Taipei Music Center at 7pm on Saturday, 31 October 2026. Taipei and Singapore share a time zone, so that is 7pm SGT too, and a livestream for international audiences means viewers here can watch from home at dinner time.
Singapore also has a stake in the night, as one of the ten markets whose artists sent work in this year.
The short version for viewers in Singapore
- What: the 17th Golden Indie Music Awards, with 109 works competing for 21 awards
- When: Saturday, 31 October 2026, 7pm SGT (7pm Taipei time)
- Where: live at Taipei Music Center, with a livestream available to international audiences
- Where to get details: GIMA’s official Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube channels, which are sharing the full nominee list, the GIMA LIVE line-up, and further details about the ceremony
- If you’re in Taipei earlier: GIMA LIVE runs on 21 and 22 October 2026 at CORNER MAX
- What to do before then: play Sunset Rollercoaster’s QUIT QUIETLY and the five Best Asian Creative Artist nominees (listening list below)
GIMA is one of Taiwan’s leading awards for original music, organised by the Bureau of Audiovisual and Music Industry Development under the island’s Ministry of Culture. This edition pulled in 4,242 submissions, and its Best Asian Creative Artist category, open to acts from across Asia outside Taiwan, drew 105 entries, the most that category has ever received.
Award season on this side of the internet usually means K-pop spectacles like the Melon Music Awards and the Golden Disc Awards, where most viewers already know every name on the bill. GIMA rewards a different habit, because the best outcome of tuning in is leaving with a handful of artists nobody in the group chat has heard of yet.
4,242 Submissions, 109 Left Standing
The pile the jury worked through included 932 albums and EPs and 79 live performance entries, and what came out the other end was a shortlist of 109 works across 21 awards. By our arithmetic, that works out to fewer than three in every hundred entries surviving.
Chairing that jury is Fang Q, bassist of Taiwanese band Cosmos People, who said the volume of entries reflects the vitality and creative diversity of Taiwan’s music scene. The shortlist backs him up, since the nominees span jazz, electronic music, hip-hop, and works rooted in different languages and local cultural traditions.
The name at the top of the nominations table belongs to Ms. Alpaca, who leads the field with six nods, one more than the band most overseas listeners will recognise first. Fang Q described her work as unusually mature. To us, a newcomer out-nominating the scene’s best-known export is the strongest argument for paying attention to this ceremony.
For a reader who has never touched Taiwanese indie, that spread is the appeal. A single evening covers more genres than most streaming playlists manage in a month, and every act on it had to get past a jury first.
What “觸 TRUE” Means
This year’s theme pairs the Taiwanese expression 觸 (chù) with the English word “TRUE”. In Taiwan, 觸 describes the feeling of being emotionally struck by something, the moment a song lands so hard that you replay it before it has finished. GIMA says the pairing is about authentic creative expression and its ability to resonate across cultures.
Themes at awards shows are often decoration, but this one fits the brief snugly. An awards programme built around original music has every reason to put that feeling on the poster, especially in a year when its regional category has grown the way it has.
Sunset Rollercoaster Carries the Familiar Flag
The most internationally recognisable name on the list is Sunset Rollercoaster, and the band is having a strong year. Its latest album QUIT QUIETLY accounts for five nominations:
- Best Album
- Best Band
- Best Alternative Pop Album
- Best Alternative Pop Song, for the track Bluebird
- Best Singer-Songwriter, for Tseng Kuo Hung, for the same record
If there’s one album to play through before 31 October so the ceremony makes sense, this is the obvious homework.
Two honours sit outside the competitive categories. The Jury Award goes to Yuhan Su for Over The Moons, and the GIMA Impact Award honours Blue Note Taipei and founder Tsai Bop for their long-standing contribution to Taiwan’s jazz culture and live music scene. Recognising a venue alongside the musicians is a nice touch, because indie scenes survive on the rooms that keep booking them.
5 Asian Nominees, 105 Hopefuls
The record-setting category covers works released between 1 July 2025 and 30 June 2026. This year’s entries came from Japan, South Korea, China, Hong Kong, the Philippines, Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore, Vietnam, and Australia. Five works made it through, and together they make a ready pre-show queue:
- ena mori, Ore
- KIKI, Death of a Daisy & Birth of an Oyster
- SHNTI, Melting PT.
- N.Y.P.D. 南洋派對, DON’T LIKE 我鍾意
- NAMDO CALLING, NAMDO CALLING
Start with the Philippines, which holds two of the five slots through indie artists ena mori and SHNTI. That is one country landing 40 per cent of a shortlist drawn from 105 entries, which we read as a sign of where the region’s momentum sits right now. Both are easy first listens.
N.Y.P.D. 南洋派對 is the pick for readers who like their bands loud and in the room together. The five-piece plays with guitars, bass, drums, and vocals, and the title of its nominated work switches between English and Chinese without stopping to explain itself.
KIKI’s Death of a Daisy & Birth of an Oyster is our favourite title on the shortlist. That is admittedly a shallow reason to press play, though plenty of favourite albums have been found on less.
The fifth nominee is the collaborative one. NAMDO CALLING is credited to Jung Eunhye, CADEJO, and Yechan Kim under the NAMDO CALLING name, which makes it the entry to try when a solo record feels too tidy for the mood.
Taken together, the five give a listener a fast route into scenes that rarely share one stage. GIMA frames the record entry count as a sign of deepening ties with music communities across the region, and a shortlist this varied makes that easy to believe.
How to Catch It: GIMA LIVE First, Then the Ceremony
Before the ceremony comes GIMA LIVE, the official lead-up to the awards, on 21 and 22 October 2026 at CORNER MAX in Taipei. The Best Live Performance nominees play their final performances there, and those two nights decide and reveal the winner. Anyone who happens to be in Taipei that week gets an award settled on stage in front of them.
The main event follows on Halloween night at Taipei Music Center, and this is the one to watch from Singapore. The full list of nominees, the GIMA LIVE line-up, and further details about the ceremony are being shared through the Golden Indie Music Awards’ official Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube channels.
🗓️ Date: Saturday, 31 October 2026
⏰ Time: 7pm (Taipei time), which is also 7pm SGT
📍 Location: Taipei Music Center
📺 Livestream: Available to international audiences
🎤 GIMA LIVE: 21 and 22 October 2026 at CORNER MAX, Taipei, where the Best Live Performance winner is revealed
🏆 In the running: 109 works competing for 21 awards
A costume party will come around again next year, but a single night that hands over Taiwan’s indie scene and five acts from across Asia is a rarer treat. Follow the Golden Indie Music Awards on Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube for the nominee list and ceremony updates, line up QUIT QUIETLY and the five Asian nominees beforehand, and note 7pm Taipei time (7pm SGT) on 31 October for the livestream.
Photos and Visuals courtesy of the Golden Indie Music Awards.
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