The 2010 Mercury Music Prize Shortlist

The xx all the way for me.

Mumford & Sons will win the real thing. I can't bring myself to vote for any of them.

I think the jury might feel Mumford are too supermarket. Nearly a million albums sold, ecstatic live crowds ... Simon Frith don't go for that. Unless he's embarrassed by the Speech Debelle affair.

I think The xx deserve to win and probably will. It's the only record on the list I really love, though there's lots to enjoy on the Dizzee and Weller records too.

i like 3.5 of these albums, that's waaaay above average for me. i prob like the xx or laura marling more but i'm voting corinne bailey rae cuz that album really surprised me this year, and it's getting v underrated in comparison.

there are some total dogs on the list though. guido and ikonika should be there! but who cares really.

Corinne Bailey Rae 'The Sea' should win

who cares about the xx

they dont need an award

dizzee shouldnt win cos if that wins then you might as well nominate fucking tinchy as well

Wild Beasts. Amazing album.

is the 0.5 Biffy Clyro, Lex?

Two Dancers is the only album I can even contemplate voting for, so I just voted for it

the rest can be blasted into space afaic

*pending a listen to Kit Downes Trio

love this song, so insouciant. best use of the word "nonchalance" since mariah's "breakdown"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J2OLBhVua5c

xps the 0.5 is dizz

i didn't even know biffy clyro were still going. or paul weller, for that matter. i swear i thought paul weller died last year. wishful thinking i guess.

what a lot of shit that list is

good luck uk

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hO7KrgALE2k

you were unnervingly delicate
and i had a weakness for etiquette

^^among my favourite couplets of the year

Lex is really selling the Corinne record to me considering that I discarded it as a snooze after one listen.

Would like to win: Laura Marling
(Laura Marling - I Speak Because I Can)

Probably will win: Corinne Bailey Rae

Will win this poll: xx

(I really like the bonus CD that came with the deluxe edition of the Dizzee album btw, more than the original CD in lots of ways)

'closer' on the CBR album is seriously amazing.

i was totally going to dismiss CBR unheard based on finding her first album a bit dull, but some +ve reviews at the jukebox made me check out the singles, and for a while a couple of months ago they were all i could play. i think what i love about that couplet, that kind of encapsulates corinne for me, is that...she is EXACTLY the kind of girl for whom etiquette makes her go weak at the knees!

jeff what makes you think she'll win? i don't see that AT ALL. if it's not the xx it'll be marling (and i'm not complaining, love both of those too).

This is probably the most worthy-but-dull shortlist in Mercury history. I Am Kloot? Really?

Laura Marling album the best there by a long chalk.

Lex what exactly is so good about that Corinne couplet?

I listened to CBR quite a bit when it came out, and liked it - not as much as Lex, but it was much more engaging than I imagined it would be. Can't say I've revisited, though.

loooooooooooooool at this list. its even worse than usual. biffy fucking clyro?

I think The xx will win, but I voted for Laura Marling because I can.

it really isn't worse than usual. last year's had kasabian, glasvegas and la cunting roux on the shortlist. the previous year had british sea power and bloody radiohead, and ELBOW ended up winning lololololol

Even you lex should understand that radiohead shouldn't be seen in the same hell as glasvegas and biffy clyro.

they're worse

voted laura marling and i haven't even listened to the record yet but it is in my 'new albums i should listen to' spotify playlist.

really?

I JUST NOTICED SADE IS MISSING

OK NOW I'M ANGRY

they're worse

*high five*

you wags

lex getting angry about the mercury music prize shortlist in 2010 is p fucking lol.

you were unnervingly delicate
and i had a weakness for etiquette

Isn't this a bit... twee?

I don't like any of the records on this list, which is probably a good thing as the years that I do like something on it I forget just how meaningless and industry back-slapping it is.

jeff what makes you think she'll win?
Sympathy vote? Mumford & Marling will cancel each other out? The xx will be bookies' favourites, so the panel will look elsewhere? All mere speculation obv.

The biggest thing counting against CBR *might* be Speech Debelle's win last year => "it's time for another band". But Some Foals v Biffy v I Am Kloot? Hardly inspiring.

if the sade album was produced like the CBR album it would have been a 100 times better

that actually is a nice little erykah-ish couplet that lex quoted

its not twee cos its amusing

mercury shortlist misses great album for four sweaty boys with guitars who once were on the cover of nme 8 months ago, news at 10. stay tuned for news of daniel sturridge's departure from city.

I couldn't even get through one CRB song. Inoffensive indie-lite of the worst sort. Those string arrangements! Make it stop, they hurt my ears with their syrup. Lex, you know I'm usually with you, but not on this one. Emil.y is right - this is just twee, no two ways about it. Feh.

I don't like any of the records on this list, which is probably a good thing as the years that I do like something on it I forget just how meaningless and industry back-slapping it is.

this

except as I say Two Dancers is pretty good, although Wild Beasts are much better live (one of the best live bands going, in fact)

i'm actually way more interested in how/whether laura marling will place in the ILM EOY poll.

cbr is better when she brings in a bit of R&B influence imo (eg - closer, like a star). otherwise her records can sound a bit politely flattened and like theyve been custom made to soundtrack a faux indie rom com.

When I want to listen to R&B I actually - you know - listen to R&B. Not some polite, over polished, over produced indie tweefest with R&B affectations. Is this how Pitchfork indie kids brownwash their music collections?

It's really not worth getting arsey about what's missing but this list is VERY broadsheety indeed. The Mumford & Sons is the only actively terrible thing in there, truly they are the O'Neill's of folk.

Villagers 'Becoming a Jackal'
Kit Downes Trio 'Golden'

No knowledge of these at all. Presumably one of them is the jazz one?

One of them has the word Trio in it, guess it's them? Villagers sounds like they'd be folky?

When I want to listen to R&B I actually - you know - listen to R&B. Not some polite, over polished, over produced indie tweefest with R&B affectations. Is this how Pitchfork indie kids brownwash their music collections?

― The Black Knight! Huzzah, My Lord! (Masonic Boom), Tuesday, 20 July 2010 12:39 (1 minute ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

seriously, can we stop with this shit? As a Pitchfork indie kid (formerly a Stylus indie kid I guess) I would like to point out that Pitchfork's last Best New Music label was given to the fucking dream (a review written by ilx's own d4vid dr4ke) and is actually a p decent place to read about hip-hop, r&b and the fucking rest.

its not pitchfork indie kids this is for, they know their badus from the bailey raes, its nme indie kids that need hunting.

CBR is more radio 2 than pfork

pfork kids brownwash their music collections with dirty projectors lol

and yeah CBR is totally polite and not very ~exciting~ but the tunes, arrangements, lyrics, character is all there on this album

plus as rev's pointed out elsewhere the structure of the album's lead single, "i'd do it all again", is pretty fucking audacious - if xenomania did it a few years ago everyone would be wetting themselves

what would make an ilm shortlist?

xx,
soldier of love,
some sort of funky album i'm not privy to,
two dancers,
i speak because i can,
...
...
...

My annual "may as well throw it straight in the bin" tenner will go on Wild Beasts, whom I dutifully just voted for on here as well. I called The Xx to win the day the album came out (NB many other people did this, also), and it may ell do, although as mentioned they don't really need the publicity. I'd love to see Villagers win.

(Surprised not to see Frightened Rabbit, Marina & The Diamonds or These New Puritans on there fwiw. )

These New Puritans record I still need to hear but the single was very good.

Villagers and KDT - please can someone illuminate!

I say keep the oldies out and devote the shortlists to those acts overflowing with energy and zest and youthful exuberance like The XX and Mumford & Sons.

ha!

Mumford & Sons are full of an exuberance that could easily be classed as youthful though! They just choose as their medium a type of music that's been around a looong time, and is thus (stereo)typically usually expected to be played by older people.

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

has anyone here heard that I Am Kloot Sky At Night? i forgot about them and didn't know they were still together.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

a single not even stifled yawn

Foals sure don't get much love

Respect to the seven people who voted for the fourth best Dizzee album over everything else here, because although only about 2/3rds of it is any good, that 2/3rds still blows everything else here out of the water.

Gonna assume the Biffy Clyro and I Am Kloot votes were jokes unless somebody wants to put their hand up for an SB.

has anyone here heard that I Am Kloot Sky At Night? i forgot about them and didn't know they were still together.

Yeah. Having increasingly lost any sense of direction on the last couple they've recovered it by roping in Guy Garvey and Craig Potter and turning themselves into a low rent Elbow. With accompanying 'They've been working away in the wilderness on great music for years and now they'll finally get noticed - just like Elbow!' press narrative, which is almost as stupid as when it got applied to Doves last year.

It is actually the best since their debut, but a looong way off that one.

hey this is on TV now. Someone's about to win. Thrilling!

I've got 5 grand on the jazz group, fingers crossed.

oh they just looked at our poll, hows about that.

RIP your knees, NV.

's alright, I'm gonna double or quits on Scotland winning Euro 2012

Hoping that Mumford and Sons will throw themselves in the millstream in despair.

hipster shite winning shite prize shocker

lock thread

if only there existed some music to help me sleep this result off

if only all british music was as good as the xx, louis?

the shortlist just shows what a healthy state british music is in

'the zz morelike' is the best bandname zing of our times

These are truly bad times.

Cheer up, Everything Everything might win the next one

(I actually like Everything Everything, so ban me)

I was gonna say even ILX could come up with a better shortlist then I look at this polls results.

I suppose it is funny that the winner is a band NME & Pitchfork have hyped up and is also loved by certain ilm posters who hate said publications.

u r upset that the xx, laura marling & dizzee beat paul weller

nope

i just dont get why something so bland as the xx gets so much praise lavished on it

I suppose it is funny that the winner is a band NME & Pitchfork have hyped up and is also loved by certain ilm posters who hate said publications.

― pfunkboy (Herman G. Neuname), Tuesday, September 7, 2010 6:12 PM (2 minutes ago) Bookmark

i suppose you could also say that this speaks to why so many people like the xx

idk man... you've been on like this year long crusade against the xx & they haven't even put out any new material or anything... i guess i would just chalk it up to the idea that other people are hearing things that you're not, or maybe you don't dig the type of music that the xx makes idk

Come back DJ Martian all is forgiven.

not everyone has to understand why everything is the way it is

i can't fathom for the life of me why people think 'merriweather post pavilion' is a landmark album but i've just accepted it

i would love to hear what others do, I just don't. Usually i can see what people like in a band even if i dislike it, but I'm just baffled by the xx love. But you're right, I'm not gonna get it now. I would gladly forget about them but then this damn award means theyre gonna be everywhere for a couple of weeks then again when their new album comes out.
xps

and yes, come back dj martian!

lets talk about the glory days of his posts instead

i didn't realize that the mercury prize was an actual thing that impacted peoples irls

i think u win money

it doesnt really, but you cant escape it in newspapers n stuff for a week or so

i checked the bbc website for the latest headlines and there it was. Turn on tv news and there it is.
anyway

wheres dj martian?

herman did u like any of the albums on this list

xp - You win money and your album sales drop I think.

i've only heard the xx but i'm willing to believe that laura marling & wild beasts are worthy

i dont own any of them

Stop now.

The weller album was his best solo album, but not an album that id say was the best album of the year or anything.

just saw this, still love that XX albums so i think the right band won, congrats.

UK 'blind' to British black female artists says Simon Frith
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-11251653

it's true

I'm just confused about what I'm meant to be feeling when I hear the XX, other than a bit gloomy that is.

Youth is overrated.

The Review Show was talking about the Mercury Prize and the future of the music industry on BBC2 last night. It's on the iPlayer if anyone's interested.