Amy Shark is known as an ARIA Award-winning singer-songwriter and judge on Australian Idol, which has been nominated for Best Entertainment Program at the 64th TV WEEK Logie Awards on August 18.
It’s been an incredible rise to the top of the Australian music industry for the 38-year-old, but it hasn’t been all smooth sailing.
Shark received plenty of knock-backs from record companies before she broke through into the mainstream – and supporting her all the way through good times and bad has been her husband of eight years, Shane Billings.
The winner of eight ARIA Awards has credited much of her success to Billings, whom she wed in May 2016.
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Billings is her husband but also her business partner – he’s her long-term in-house manager and the pair consider each other the best of friends as well as romantic partners.
“I have always kind of co-managed Amy. Partner or not, I love her music, I love her live shows, I love the artist she is – so managing someone like Amy is the best job in the world,” Billings once told The Industry Observer.
And Shark has also spoken about her husband’s immense support after she won an ARIA in 2018.
“He – and I didn’t know he was doing this – was still sending my songs to labels and managers and trying to get something happening for me even when I had called it a day,” she revealed to Fairfax Media.
“Shane wanted it for me more than I think I wanted it for myself. He believed I was good enough even when I didn’t.”
Ironically, the tough times Shark went through before people began to stand up and take notice of her music has ultimately helped her as a judge on Australian Idol.
Shark has appeared on two seasons of the popular Seven show, winning a Logie in 2023 for the Graham Kennedy Award for Most Popular Talent.
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Firstly, she shared judging duties with Sandilands and American stars Harry Connick Jr and Meghan Trainor. Then it was an all-Aussie panel with Sandilands and Shark joined by former judge and beloved music icon Marcia Hines.
Shark’s compassion and enthusiasm for contestants brought a lovely warmth and sensitivity to the show, a nice counterbalance to Sandilands’ trademark snarkiness, but she once admitted that she struggled with having to give any kind of negative feedback.
”I think I’ve got a grip of it a lot better this season – because I really struggled that first year, to the point where I was like, ‘I don’t think I can do this again’,” she told The Daily Telegraph early in 2024.
But then she realised that the knock-backs she had received in her own career had only made her tougher and stronger.
”Those ‘nos’ are crucial, (although) I didn’t think it when it was happening,” she said.
”I was angry and bitter and everything, but when you look back, you’re like, ‘Wow, if I didn’t have all those knock-backs, I just wouldn’t have the thick skin that I have now’.”
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All about Amy Shark’s husband
Standing by her side through it all has been Billings.
Billings is Shark’s husband and manager.
Incredibly, however, when she signed her first record deal – two years after marrying Billings – she had to keep her marital status a secret.
At the time, Shark believed female pop stars were expected by their record companies to appear single and desirable – and at first, Billings was on board with that.
”At first he was like, ‘Take your ring off!’ she told The Herald Sun.
”We were petrified because we had finally got a record deal and things were happening, and at the time, there was still this old-school thought that things might work better if I was mysterious.”
And while she still doesn’t post a lot of pictures of her husband on social media, Shark and Billings feel differently about it all now.
”Now people can think whatever they want to think,” she said.
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”People get excited to see him; if they spot him side of stage at a show there are more photos of him than me!”
Olga Scorer
Olga is a digital writer for New Idea. With a focus on lifestyle content, she enjoys talking about all things beauty, fashion, and wellbeing .
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