Albums of the Year 2010

Creating a list of your top ten albums of the year should, on the face of it, be relatively easy. The biggest enemy is time. If an album released in February is still much treasured by December there’s a fair chance it’s going to remain a favourite. An album released only three or four weeks ago is harder to judge. Sometimes no matter how much you think you love something initially, time tells a different tale. Look back through your record collection and you’ll almost inevitably find something that will make you question your state of mind at the time. That’s OK though, records are like human relationships. Some form long term partnerships from the start, some grow on you and some start in a fury of passion but quickly die out.

The next biggest enemy is order. Is it really possible to say that X album is eighth best and Y is ninth? Wake up, roll over and on the next day X may be nine and Y seven.

Against this context, over the next ten days we present our ten albums of the year. Some will be no surprise to regular readers of the blog, but some may be. This is a personal list of the records that we’ve formed the best relationships with this year – be it something deep and long lasting or something a little more heady, giddy and spontaneous that will shortly fizzle out. A number of them appear on other published lists - after all a good album is a good album, and sometimes a number of people are going to agree. Right? Then there's taste. It's a funny old thing that maybe explains why one or two of our choices may be a little different. We're possibly going out on a limb with our #8 and #2 choices for example. It's not that our taste is good or bad, right or wrong - just different to some others, sometimes.

This time next year we may think differently about some of these albums, right now that’s impossible to tell, nobody can predict the future. However, we’re damn sure that the top 3 in our list will remain as our top 3. Whilst we might internally quarrel about the relative merits and positions of the albums listed between 4 and 10, our number 1 album stands majestically above everything else we’ve heard this year – and albums 2 and 3 are also solid in their positions.

But before that, here are five acts that didn't quite make our top ten, but whom all produced fine albums this year that would have certainly featured in our top 20. There are videos from Emeralds experimental sci-fi retro synth brilliance on Does It Look Like I'm Here ? and Foals development to a more expansive sound on Total Life Forever, plus streams from Kylie's solid pop on Aphrodite, our One's to Watch 2009 Marina and the Diamond's coming up trumps with her idiosyncratic debut and London's Revere showing just what can be done in terms of dynamics with their album Hey Selim!

Then below all that we recap our previous albums of the year from 2008 and 2009. Our countdown for this year starts tomorrow around 5pm GMT.

Get Outta My Way by kylieminogue

The Escape Artist by Revere

Shampain by Marina and The Diamonds

Our 2 previous years top 10.

Albums of the Year 2009

1.Blue Roses - Blue Roses

2. The XX - XX

3. The Antlers - Hospice

4. Florence and the Machine - Lungs

5. La Roux - La Roux

6. Mumford and Sons - Sigh No More

7. Fuck Buttons - Tarot Sport

8. The Unthanks - Here’s The Tender Coming

9. Lucky Elephant - Starsign Trampoline

10. The Horrors - Primary Colours

Albums of the Year 2008

1. Bon Iver – For Emma, Forever Ago

2. Elbow – The Seldom Seen Kid

3. Glasvegas – Glasvegas

4. Laura Marling – Alas I Cannot Swim

5. Vampire Weekend – Vampire Weekend

6. Scarlett Johansson – Anywhere I Lay My Head

7. Lykke Li – Youth Novels

8. James Yuill – Turning Down Water For Air

9. Duffy – Rockferry

10. TV On The Radio – Dear Science

Best Albums Of 2009

Excuse us for breaking our own rules again, but we're sneaking in two blogs today, of which this is the second. Over the last ten days we have posted our top ten albums of the year. Some of these crop up on virtually every critics / publications / bloggers list ( The XX and Fuck Buttons in particular). Others seem to be pretty unique to us (Lucky Elephant, The Unthanks, Blue Roses). That’s personal taste for you.

Here’s a summary of those albums.

1. Blue Roses - Blue Roses

2. The XX - XX

3. The Antlers - Hospice

4. Florence and the Machine - Lungs

5. La Roux - La Roux

6. Mumford and Sons - Sigh No More

7. Fuck Buttons - Tarot Sport

8. The Unthanks - Here’s The Tender Coming

9. Lucky Elephant - Starsign Trampoline

10. The Horrors - Primary Colours

You can read individual blogs on each record in the previous ten posts.

We've rather arrogantly called this list the Best Albums of 2009, but that of course is only our opinion. Maybe the list should have been described as Breaking More Waves Blog Favourite Albums Of The Year. This would have been more accurate. For who are we, or for that matter anyone, to say what really is the best ? We've noticed on a number of other albums of the year polls / threads / articles how passionate and often angry people are when a particular album doesn't make the Top 10 / 50 in a particular list. The number of comments we have read that are along the lines of "You are wrong because you didn't pick so and so, my favourite album, in your list." Or even worse "Call yourself a critic / journalist / blogger and you haven't picked my favourite album. You don't know what you're talking about and should be embarrassed for yourself."

Frankly we find these types of comments a little ridiculous. Music is a vast and wonderful thing, and there is always going to be someone who disagrees with a particular choice. To these people we say, lighten up and get over it. Just because someone has different tastes from you doesn't devalue or increase the value and listening pleasure of a particular album for you as the listener does it ? Our favourite Blue Roses by Blue Roses may not have appeared in any end of year lists (except The Fly who put it in their mid 30's) but for us it is still musical perfection. No end of year list will change our opinion on that, but we're not going to get angry that it didn't appear on any other lists. It would be like getting angry because not every man in the country fancies our girlfriend.

So we are done with lists till next year. We are suffering from list overload, so let’s get back to business as usual until Christmas with just a few more blogs, the first of which we will post tommorow at our standard time of just gone midnight.

Then once Christmas is here, we will take a short break and start reposting from January 1st. Next year is already shaping up to be a good one. Just in the first couple of months there are new releases from Midlake, Delphic, Los Campesinos, Vampire Weekend, First Aid Kit, Hot Chip, Yeasayer, The Tindersticks, The Dawn Chorus, Massive Attack, Marina and the Diamonds as well as gigs by a number of the acts we listed on our Ones To Watch list including Ellie Goulding, Delphic, Mirrors, Hurts, Stornoway and Beth Jeans Houghton.

See you down the front.

Blue Roses - Blue Roses - Album of the Year #1

It seems appropriate that on the 1st January 2009 we posted an article here at Breaking More Waves introducing the music of Blue Roses and by December we are naming the same act as our album of the year. Blue Roses has retained a significant presence on our stereo through the whole of 2009 since spring and will do so for many years to come, such is the timeless nature of the recording.

Laura Groves from Shipley, near Bradford, effectively is Blue Roses, although the project has encompassed a variety of other musicians to help her form this wonderfully layered piece. Recorded in living rooms, bedrooms, bathrooms and a piano shop after hours, it is an album of sublime musical depth that casts magical soft hued spells on its listener. With a sound that verges from classical piano on Greatest Thoughts to softly spun acoustic guitar on Can’t Sleep, it is a record that in a year that was lazily heralded as that of the synth pop girls, only shares a similarity in the tag that Laura is female. This is not an album of instant pop thrills, it does not contain colourful quirkiness and it certainly isn’t an in-fashion album. It is an album that comes from a very personal perspective, focussing on relationships, experiences and how Laura’s surroundings were linked to them. These themes are carried by Laura’s Kate Bush meets Joanna Newsom choir girl voice and natural organic musicianship.

We have often said that talent doesn’t necessarily concern us. What matters to us if is a song, a record or a performance has an emotional connection in some way. With Blue Roses there is undiluted talent and a huge connection. This album will never grace the top forty, nor will Blue Roses will ever be a household name. It is the antithesis of every X Factor / Britain’s Got Talent TV show that exists, and for that matter Rage Against The Machine as well, and is all the more delightful for it.

The irony of this album being listed as our favourite of the year comes from the Blue Roses website. Here her biography states “Instant praise is neither expected nor sought; Blue Roses is not the stuff of lists, tip offs or hollow press recommendations.” Well, this is certainly no hollow recommendation, although it is at the top of a list, albeit from the ones we have seen, only ours. Blue Roses by Blue Roses is our album of the year. Quite simply an evocative and perfect recording - the sound of beauty.

The XX - XX - Album of the Year #2

Here are some words that describe the debut album from The XX. Beautiful, minimalist, understated, restrained, downbeat. It must be something that they put in the water at Elliot School comprehensive in Putney, because The XX step out from the same place of education as did Burial. Now of course Burial released the mighty Untrue, another record that was beautiful, minimalist, understated, restrained and downbeat. Yet The XX’s template is much more pop. In fact if the songs on this album weren’t so gorgeously lackadaisical we could imagine a group like the Sugababes or Girls Aloud covering one of them and having a big hit.

XX is a cohesive and sparse record that demonstrates that it is still possible to take something unique and hazily wonderful from the genre that is known as indie. The album is constructed from touches of darker new wave bands such as The Cure in the ghostly guitar sounds, electronic beats that avoid elaboration and the unembellished sultry tones of dual boy girl vocalists Romy and Oliver. The two of them claim they are not a couple, but sound perfectly matched for each other, trading lyrics concerning relationships making up and breaking up throughout the album in sultry, dulcet tones.

But despite the unique laid back atmosphere of this album, where the space between the notes matters as much as the notes themselves, what stands out are the songs. Gorgeous, sensual songs that make no grandiose attempt to grab the attention with big riffs and epic choruses. Instead The XX softly sneak into your bedroom, lift the covers and climb in without you even noticing until their arm is around you.

If you haven’t yet been seduced by The XX, do yourself a favour with any cash you receive this Christmas and buy this album.

Our original review is here.

The Antlers - Hospice - Album of the Year #3

In our original review of The Antlers Hospice (read it here) in September we said that it was “an extraordinary album that demands to be physically owned and consumed with your ears from start to finish.” At year end we find ourselves fully agreeing with what we said back then. Hospice is a profound and sonically dynamic album that gets better and better with every listen.

Hospice is by no means an easy listen musically or lyrically. It has central themes of death, abuse, attempted suicide, ghosts and hospital machinery combined with a dense often all consuming musical structure that is as harrowing as the lyrics. The moment when lead singer Peter Silberman screams “Sylvia, get your head out of the oven,” as a barrage of white guitar noise crashes and storms the ears is as euphoric as it is depressingly sad. This is why Hospice works - it’s an album that in weaker hands would have sounded trite and schoolboy sixth form, but under Silberman’s guidance is mighty, intense and full of heavy dark weight.

It is never clear if the lyrical narrative of Hospice is fictional or based on real events, loosely the record deals with the relationship between a patient and another, heading into memories of abuse before death, but ultimately its extent of truth doesn’t matter. The test of any album is in the listening experience and Hospice succeeds as a squalling, shimmering, wrenching, exploding thing of dramatic beauty.

The video below is not an official video but a collection of photos meticulously pieced together by fan Dan Sully. The content of the photos is absolutely stunning and capture the music perfectly. Take five minutes out of your daily life to soak up this beautiful piece of art and music.

Florence And The Machine - Lungs - Album of the Year #4

When we put Florence and the Machine in our ones to watch list last year we complimented her crazed stage presence and bluesy shriek of a vocal, but suggested that she may be just a little too oddball for the mainstream. It seems that she wasn’t. Her debut album Lungs produced by Paul Epworth, James Ford and Steve Mackay managed to achieve both significant critical acclaim and commercial success, only being held off the top of the UK charts by the death of a certain Michael Jackson. Lungs is an album of exuberant dramatic songs delivered by an huge production that took elements of show stopping female singers such as Annie Lennox, Kate Bush and PJ Harvey and added Florences’s own pagan, tribal, mystical and slightly off beat personality to tracks such as Rabbit Heart (Raise It Up) and Cosmic Love.

In 2009 Florence Welch has become a proper pop star and this is partly because of the fearless songs that feature on Lungs. From the raw indie punk and clattering crashing rhythms of Kiss With A Fist to the joyous gut punching vocal, handclaps and skipping piano of Between Two Lungs, we are talking massive here. Lungs is a cloudbursting album of harps, choirs and bells for which the word celestial was designed. It’s an exhaustingly extravagent recording that is not afraid to shout from the mountaintops how great it is. Thank you Florence, we’re glad you shouted and that people heard. It’s one of our albums of the year.

La Roux - La Roux - Album of the Year #5

It’s incredibly easy to be dismissive of La Roux . With Elly Jackson’s shrill voice, her fixation with 80’s synth sounds, her petulant frown, her sometimes naive and aggressive comments in interviews ( but surely better to have pop stars with personality rather than those who have had their personality sucked out of them by media training ?) and that haircut ( we can only assume Jedward were taking notes) La Roux were in danger of being considered a novelty act.

Yet at the end of 2009 the debut La Roux album is our favourite pop record of the year, beating all other contenders (Lady Ga Ga, Lily Allen, Little Boots) by a mile. The reason ? For exactly the same reason as we chose Mumford and Sons Sigh No More at number 6 in our list yesterday. Great songs. The evidence ? In For The Kill - a number 2 hit. Bulletproof - a number 1 hit. Sometimes the public get it right. Furthermore this success was achieved without a high profile X Factor campaign or a TV advert to sell the tunes. In For The Kill slowly climbed the charts over a number of weeks as the public heard the song, loved it and purchased it. Such slow burners don’t happen very often in these days where radio plays the singles weeks before release or campaigns push songs to the top straight away.

Of course two songs don’t make an album. But this is where La Roux conquers - the album is packed full of songs that could easily have been hit singles. Fascination with its driving synth riff and ridiculously hooky chorus. Tigerlily with its quirky synth harpsicord sound and punching tightly cut beats. As If By Magic with its softer early Depeche / Yazoo pop sound. The album may have been very narrow in its musical vision - every track referencing the Vince Clarke / Blancmange revival template, but the great songs tunnelled it through. Where La Roux goes next will be interesting to see. We’re pretty sure there will have to be some musical departures to keep the public interested - a second album of the same will purge this 80’s sound of any remaining audience affection, but in 2009 La Roux by La Roux stands atop our pop throne.

\\\ LA ROUX /// IN FOR THE KILL

LA ROUX | MySpace Music Videos

Mumford and Sons - Sigh No More - Album of the Year #6

October saw the release of two albums that have both made it into our year end top ten. Tarot Sport (see yesterday) was one and Sigh No More by Mumford and Sons is the other. Mumford and Sons are also the first of three artists that last year we named in our ones to watch for 2009 list who have produced debut recordings that feature in our album of the year list.

Of all of our favourite albums of this year Sigh No More is probably the most straightforward. It’s a collection of well crafted songs formed from a mix of bluegrass, folk, gospel and mainstream rock. It’s a strong and instant enough collection to appeal to those who own Kings Of Leon and Scouting For Girls CD’s, yet powerful and deep enough to appeal to those whose musical horizons stretch a little further than the mainstream. Mumford and Sons have put together a recording of majestic melodies that soar into peoples affections with ease. Each song on Sigh No More is neither fussy or complicated, but every one has elegant force. Such force is achieved through moments of lyrical tenderness, down-on-the-farm fireside warm gravel vocals and musical euphoric swells that are ably assisted by the production of Arcade Fire producer Markus Dravs. The mood is often painted with downbeat, reflective segments, but these are tempered with thumping banjo hoedowns and foot down on the accelerator rabble rousing stomps, albeit these stomps are always kept under a leash so as to never take over and destroy the atmosphere set.

If Sigh No More, through its significant airing of the singles Little Lion Man and Winter Winds on the radio has engaged new fans to this genre of music, then the world is a better place. If it hasn’t, then the world is still a better place for its existence. You just can’t keep a good song down.

Fuck Buttons - Tarot Sport - Album of the Year #7

This is the scene. A dark nightclub basement of the future, strobe lights pulsing. The kids are wired. Sweat is dripping from the low black ceiling. Having it.

Then this tune begins. A twitching, soaring avant-garde piece of gibbering electronica that builds and builds into a colossal wall of sound. It’s a spontaneous audio orgasm, crashing, menacing and utterly delirious. Now everybody is off their faces. Strangers are having sex with each other. Men with women. Boys with girls. Boys with boys. Girls with girls. Everywhere. Wherever you look everyone has blissed out smiles on their ecstatic faces. This is Surf Solar. This is Fuck Buttons

Surf Solar is the lead track from Fuck Buttons second album Tarot Sport. It is worth buying the album purely for this ten minutes and thirty three seconds of cacophonous layered electronica. It’s the sound of the robot armageddon on acid. But this is an album of the year list and Tarot Sport by Fuck Buttons deserves its place at number seven not just because of one track.

Tarot Sport is an album that pushes musical boundaries a little. Whilst there are elements of shoe gaze, electronica, ambient and dance in what Fuck Buttons have produced, it forms a head trip genre all of its own. Tarot Sport is mind-bendingly out there. Every track is constructed to deliver you on a hypnotic, trance like journey. Be ready to immerse yourself.

An electronic post-rock masterpiece? Almost and very nearly. Let's go have sex.

Read our original review here.

The Unthanks - Here's The Tender Coming - Album of the Year #8

With line up changes and sister Becky Unthank committing full time to the Northumbrian group, Rachel Unthank and the Winterset changed their name to just The Unthanks for their third album Here’s The Tender Coming. The follow up to their Mercury Prize nominated album The Bairns, Here’s The Tender Coming represents a warmer calmer feel compared to The Bairns, but is equally as good, and often as sad. As with previous recordings The Unthanks continued to tap into their local areas traditions, taking Northumbrian folk songs and tales passed down from previous generations, adding their own mark on the tunes.

The voices of Becky and Rachel remain the centrepiece of the music. Becky with a deeper breathy intonation, Rachel with a more girlish lighter pitch, their tones matching perfectly. The musicianship on every song is also exemplary, a rewarding mix of strings, piano, and guitars. The tunes the group have chosen for this album are fascinating. For example, the lyrics to The Testimony Of Patience Kershaw are the real words spoken by a 17 year old girl to the Royal Commission on Children’s Employment in 1842; the girl worked in the mines. The songs may initially not have the immediacy of the standout tracks from The Bairns, but as their steady sadness envelopes you they draw you back time and time again. One suspects this will be an album that we still listen to in twenty years time.

The Unthanks may be a relatively young band, but because of their traditional roots have not found themselves grouped in with the currently fashionable sounds of the new folk scene with groups such as Mumford and Sons, Noah and the Whale or Laura Marling. Having now recorded three albums of the highest quality The Unthanks can be proud to have created music that exists outside of any type of fashion. Here’s The Tender Coming is a timeless and captivating recording and deserves to hold a place in any folk music fans collection, old or young.

Lucky Elephant - Starsign Trampoline - Album of the Year #9

It is an inevitable fact that end of the year album lists will invariably be somewhat homogenous. If an artist has put out a great album it gives us faith in human ears if as a species we are collectively able to detect this greatness. The evidence is end of year lists showing some degree of consistency with each other. However our different make ups will mean that understandably some albums that are enthused about by some will be less loved by others.

Sometimes however wonderful albums just don’t quite get the exposure they deserve and are not therefore placed up for consideration at the end of the year. Starsign Trampoline by Lucky Elephant is one such album.

A beautiful treasure trove of organic, vintage sounds created from wurlitzers, melodicas, pianos, acoustic guitar, glockenspiel, and organs all topped off with the romantic sound of lead singer Manu’s wonderfully French accented nasal tones, Starsign Trampoline deserves a bigger audience than it has obtained. Every song on it is perfectly and tenderly crafted with real attention to detail. On this album you will find songs such as the melancholic The Pier where Manu laments the coming of the commercial tide to his seaside town and the destruction of its identity. Further on the dusky glowing chimes of the environmental Call It The End (The Beginning) sound sweetly sagacious as Manu sings “The iceberg is our ageing dreams, and if you let go don’t fight the windmills.” Starsign Trampoline also features a number of superb instrumentals - the cartoon like self titled Lucky Elephant, the laid back Burn Down The Acres and the restful and comforting When You Fall To Earth. These instrumentals are not mere filler, but key tracks in the albums construction.

Starsign Trampoline is an utterly charming album that earlier this year we compared to a summer evening. It works equally as well in the winter, such is its timeless quality. It’s our little secret, but we don’t mind if you tell the rest of the world.

Our original write up was here

The Horrors - Primary Colours - Album of the Year #10

The Horrors sophomore album saw the band cast away from their major record label deal into the garbage bin. But amongst the refuse were discarded vinyl copies of albums by My Bloody Valentine, Bauhaus, shoe gaze bands and post-punk art school rock. It was these reference points that were the bands escape from being taken to the incinerator. It gave The Horrors a new stimulating direction without being a step too far away from their debut recording Strange House. Primary Colours is a psychedelic, dirty and fuzzy mix of noise that whilst obviously referencing the past became a darkly glorious listen in the present. By the end of the year it had received a nomination for the Mercury music prize and was the NME's album of the year. It is self assured, exciting and sonically rewarding in its monochromatic haze.

Primary Colours is an empowered piece of rock music that celebrates the fact that not every over hyped indie band will fall at the second hurdle. Better than we could have ever had expected, Primary Colours brings the goth crown to our albums of the year list. Our original review can be found here.

Albums of the Year 2009

With our Ones To Watch for 2010 complete, Breaking More Waves is about to take a Christmas break. We just have one more feature to roll, a look back at our top ten albums of the year, with one album published each day as we count down to our absolute favourite and number one. The concept of producing an albums of the year list and grading them in order of brilliance is somewhat ludicrous. After all how can one subjectively order ten great albums in a linear comparative ranking? The fact is we could have easily have chosen any of our Top 4 albums as our number 1, but to satisfy those who possess almost autistic tendencies, an ordered list is what we present. Unlike our ones to watch list which was simply a group of ten, this is a group of ten with a winner. Expect some obvious choices and a couple that you probably haven't seen on any other best albums of 2010 list.

Then after that expect just the odd blog until you see us back in January for more of the same. It’s been a good year musically and we’ve been energised by the nice comments we’ve had about the blog, the way our readership and subscription has grown, how we have been asked to guest write for other blogs, make the odd local radio appearance and were chosen to be one of the 'music tastemakers' voting in the BBC Sound of 2010 poll. Thank you for everyone who has taken the time out to read Breaking More Waves. There’s no point in writing it if nobody is reading.

This year we feel we’ve really firmed up our vision for what the blog is about, and to a greater extent what it isn't about. If you want free MP3’s then we suggest you look elsewhere, there are plenty of blogs that cater for you. If you want just one style of music then this also isn’t the blog for you. If you want a blog to name check and be one of the hip indie kids then this certainly isn’t the blog to check. If you like a blog that looks cool and isn’t just a standard Blogspot template this isn’t the blog for you. If you want a blog that simply posts up all the press releases, news ad reviews of freebies it receives with no real vision about what it stands for, then this isn't the blog for you. If you want artfully clever literate journalism then this isn’t the blog for you.

But if like us, you like reading all types of blogs and think that the variety of such internet publications is what makes the music blogosphere an exciting place - a place free from editorial and commercial demands - and just love music music music, then Breaking More Waves may be one of the blogs for you. To use a cliche, it really is all about the music.

Next year we’ll be bringing more live reviews, debating music related issues, writing about new acts that we believe are worth you giving some time to, reviewing albums and singles and expanding our new guilty pleasures series. We hope you visit often. Right, we will stop blowing our own trumpet now, and start giving the fanfare to those who in our opinion really deserve it.

It’s time to ready our albums of the year list. In reverse order, our favourite works of 2009. There's a fair deal of variation in this list, but what binds each of these recordings together is that they are all complete bodies of work created by artists that have excited us immensely in 2009. Get ready. Here from tomorrow come our albums of the year. Let us know what yours are.

Mercury Music Prize 2009 Nominations - Part 2

Yesterday saw the announcement of the 2009 Mercury Music Prize nominations, and as usual there are some nominees that were widely predicted, and a handful of esoteric acts that may benefit significantly from the exposure a Mercury nomination can give. The list contains a number of Breaking More Waves favourites as well as one or two that we’re not so keen on. Florence And The Machine was probably the most widely tipped act to be nominated, and it was no surprise to find her on the list. The nomination was completely justified, Lungs is a fabulous powerful album that sounds good on first listen and gets even better as the days go on. You can read our review here.

After the nominations were announced the usual plethora of articles rapidly appeared on the internet either praising or damning the list, and trying to find connections between the musical styles. Drowned In Sound called it trendy and electro poppy in this article here whilst the Telegraph suggested that it was advertising the death of the genre here. (Note also in the comments section of the article Breaking More Waves correcting the journalists mistake !) Popjustice of course came up with the best article, announcing the Popjustice Twenty Quid Music Prize, with nominations including JLS, The Saturdays and Calvin Harris. Interesting to note that La Roux was nominated in the Twenty Quid Prize list, and features in the Mercury nominations as well. We think this says something about La Roux. In terms of being the sound of 2009 La Roux is it. But then La Roux is also the sound of 1982. La Roux ticks many boxes and appeals to many types and ages of people. Her singles have defined the year – big commercial pop songs that have appealed universally making a sound that until recently was considered cheesy, but is now mainstream and cool again. If the judges are going to define the prize with an album that defined the year in the same way that they did with The Arctic Monkeys Whatever People Say I Am That’s What I’m Not then La Roux will take it.

So what of the other acts ? The other day in Part 1 of this article we talked about artists in less populist genres such as folk and jazz who can use the award to receive wider recognition. This year we are pleasantly surprised to see the Lisa Hannigan album get the vote and this exposure can only lead to increased sales for Sea Sew. Curiously Lisa’s album was nominated for the Irish Choice Prize earlier this year, and therefore we had assumed it wasn’t eligible for inclusion in the Mercury list. Several articles have already appeared stating how unknown Lisa is, but we would contest that Lisa is more well known than many would think, following her work in the past with Snow Patrol and Damien Rice. We caught Lisa live earlier this year and you can read our review here. Other acts that will surely gain from exposure include jazz group Led Bib , who many had predicted would be nominated for Sensible Shoes and Sweet Billy Pilgrim with Twice Born Men who provide an inviting proposition of beautiful country, folk and experimentation. They remind us of Elbow with banjos in their song construction. We think they could well be a good bet as a dark horse.

Then of course there are higher profile acts. Kasabian will be pleased to be on the list with West Ryder Pauper Lunatic Asylum, the buzz being that their current album of lad rock is their best yet. It guarantees them more radio play and further progression through the year leading towards the end of year polls. It’s not really Breaking More Waves cup of tea, but all credit to Kasabian nonetheless. Bat For Lashes aka Natasha Khan has now released two albums, both of which have been nominated for the prize. In terms of some of the reference points (we mentioned Enya in our review here ) there are some similarities to the Florence And The Machine album, although we prefer Lungs by some way. Last year we put Glasvegas at number three in our album of the year listings. Last years winners Elbow were number two. A masculine album that wears its heart on its dense wall of noise sleeve, Glasvegas may suffer from having been released last year when up against very now albums such as Florence and La Roux but we are pleased to see that it has not been forgotten.

At a time when UK urban and black music in general is going through a bit of a fallow period in terms of albums, Speech Debelle seems to be one of the few shining lights and her cool jazzy hip hop will probably reach a few more coffee tables through its nomination. Another dance influenced and highly predicted choice, the Friendly Fires debut has been a slow burner, gradually picking up interest as it funks and shakes its way across student union dance floors and the radio. It does raise the question of where are the nominations for purist genre specific dance music on the list? In the past acts such as Basement Jaxx, Hot Chip, The Prodigy and The Chemical Brothers have all made the list but this year there is a gap.

Another smile was raised when we saw the inclusion of The Horrors. Who would have thought a couple of years ago that The Horrors second album would end up as a Mercury nomination in 2009? We’re very pleased about this. It probably has very little chance of winning, (although what do we know) being maybe just a little too obvious in its references, but Primary Colours certainly deserves its place. Read our review of the album here.

Which leads us to the final act on the list - The Invisible. This is the only act we shrugged our shoulders a little to. Having caught them live earlier this year supporting Doves their funky blend of urgent rock pop failed to move us, which we found surprising as the huge number of comparisons to TV On The Radio made by the press would suggest that we really should like The Invisible. That’s music for you though, full of contradictions.

So that’s the nominations dealt with. There were also some high profile acts that were not on the list. Doves Kingdom Of Rust had been widely predicted to ‘do an Elbow’ by many, but didn’t make it. We agree with the panels view on this one, it left us feeling a little disappointed. You can see our full thoughts here on that one. Likewise Hands by Little Boots has not made the cut. Cynically we could suggest she has been beaten by La Roux again. Victoria Hesketh could have done with the nomination to help her not particularly impressive sales figures, which we documented here, but despite some neat pure pop melodies maybe there wasn’t enough innovation on the Little Boots album to be considered for a Mercury.

So that’s it. The runners are now officially racing. Who is going to win ? Well, the last few years we have had reasonable success rates at picking the winners - three out of the last four. Our personal favourites are Florence And The Machine and The Horrors, but we’re liking what we have heard so far of Sweet Billy Pilgrim as well. But this year we’re really not sure if our own personal tastes will match the panels, so we’re going to cop out and not make a prediction. What do you think ?

But even after the votes have been cast later this year, we'll be putting any wrongs right. Come December the most authoritative and damn special Top Ten Albums Of The Year List will be published. Right here. Humble ? Not this blog !

Here's our little bit of exposure for Lisa Hannigan, certainly in our opinion one of the most unexpected nominations, but also one of the most gratifying.

Mercury Music Prize 2009 Nominations - Part 1

On the 21st of July 2009 the shortlist for the Mercury Music Prize will be announced. If previous years are anything to go by, there will be some artists where the consensus agrees that the artist is a worthy nominee and others where shoulders are shrugged and puzzled faces appear.

What we always particularly like about the Mercury Prize is that (in theory) it has nothing to do with sales and is all to do with quality. Often some of the less populist genres such as folk and jazz can receive nominations that can bring new exposure to these artists that can lead to significant increases in sales. Some may sneer and call them ‘token entries’ but the reality is that far more rock and pop albums are released in a year than these other genres and therefore proportionally there will always be fewer of such genres on the shortlist. Last year we were delighted when Rachel Unthank and the Winterset received a nomination – The Bairns was such a delightful recording and the Mercury Prize nomination took the group to a much wider audience. So this year amongst the heavyweights, we will be looking with interest at some of the less well known acts. Personally amongst this type of smaller artist we would like to see Blue Roses (Classical / folk / pop), Robert Mitchell (Jazz) and The Leisure Society (Folk / Pop) receive nominations.

Until the awards are released, you can keep up to date with the speculation on this thread here and there is an interesting article written by one of the previous panels judges here . In the meantime we’re off to find that needle in the haystack. And when the awards are announced you can read our commentary on them here