Mercury Prize 2021 - Are Mogwai the new Gaz?

voted for blue weekend but i love several records on this list

nubya garcia, love that record. sault, floating points/pharoah, and wolf alice all worthy.

awards are stupid, the Mercury is super stupid, Ghetts album is good, no Sons of Kemet or Pa Salieu - YES IT COUNTS FUCK OFF - renders this pointless exercise pointlesser, lol Mogwai, says it all

Noodle Vague has weighed in, sorry guys, pack it up.

how dare anyone over 30 get nominated for awards

NV voting for Ghetts then

Celeste album has some good songs on it but that big single is ugggh and i can't tell if it was always ugggh or if it's been advertised to death but probably both

I wouldn't be upset if the Floating Points/Pharaoh Sanders record one, Sanders deserves to get all the accolades he can gather while he's around to enjoy them, even if I don't think it's the best album nominated (that would be Sault with, Mogwai (gasp!) a distant second).

Arlo will win this probably

NV likely otm, but the answer is Nubya Garcia

SAULT.

Really enjoyed both Garcia and Floating Points/Sanders.

i haven't heard the Garcia yet i'd imagine she's in with a shout of being best thing on here

would be cool if the gwai won because it would be the most annoying result

well yeah certainly the funniest

wolf alice should've been a band name in 2005

wish I could vote for them twice

i should really want Mogwai to win and would be delighted if they did but haven't heard it.

I'll probably never listen to it but I'd imagine it has a lot of "shimmering guitars"

i should really want Mogwai to win and would be delighted if they did but haven't heard it.

― stirmonster, Thursday, July 22, 2021 5:50 PM (thirty-one minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

The "I quite like them but I haven't heard their latest album" kind of sums up my relationship to Mogwai! That said, I got irritated by the "Get them to No 1" campaign, for some reason.

lol, I quite like them but fuck them for being rewarded with success, right?

Ha! I'm not sure it was this, really.

Just bugs me when people shit on generally non-objectionable band when it comes to markers of success. I mean, yes, all of the "get them to No 1" campaigns are kind of silly, but seeing how genuinely thrilled and appreciative the guys in Mogwai were made me happy for them. Honestly they've been plugging away for so long and being, at the very least, a very good band for much of that time that I'm thankful for them to get more recognition.

It rankles to see people complain about how artists aren't appreciated enough but suddenly are more than happy to take potshots at any of them that achieve markers of "mainstream" success.

Mogwai are from Hamilton, and it's awesome to have someone from my town on there.

stuart braithwaite, paul mcstay and me. the most illustrious holy cross alumni

Stuart Braithwaite went to Hutchesons afaik

really? posho. gone off them now

actually wiki says strathaven academy, that's fine then

aye but that bloody Pharoah Sanders was a public school boy I hear.

His mum was my mates GP and said he definitely went to hutchesons. But who knows

Its not really important or anything,and its only hearsay, but it would be funny after them hating Blur for being posh it turned out he was.

I'm surprised they didn't include any of the hyped up post-punk bands who seem to be a big deal at the moment. I thought Squid, Dry Cleaning, Black Midi or Shame might be on there.

Voted for Wolf Alice just ahead of Laura Mvula.

black country new road kinda fit into that milieu though they're certainly the worst of them

voted for wolf alice but sault & floating points are both close behind.

pa salieu really should have been here though wtf

Oh right, I guess I haven't heard Black Country New Road properly. Dry Cleaning are the only ones I'd have been happy to see here.

I'm surprised they didn't include any of the hyped up post-punk bands who seem to be a big deal at the moment. I thought Squid, Dry Cleaning, Black Midi or Shame might be on there.

Same here, I was definitely expecting to see Dry Cleaning or Black Midi on there. At first I wondered if it was a release date cut off thing, but based on their criteria, that's not it:

Albums released between 18 July 2020 and 16 July 2021 (inclusive) are eligible for the 2021 Hyundai Mercury Prize.

x-posts: Just for clarity, I wasn't taking pot shots at Mogwai for being successful more acknowledging the oddity of quite liking them/not getting round to properly hearing their album that seems acclaimed.

Mogwai have talked so much shite over the years about not being sellouts so it's kinda funny they had to beg celebs to retweet them to try and get to no 1 but whatever works

the blur-hating was just trolling, they were headlining different stages at the same night of the same festival or sth, this was around the same time they got officially sponsored by Kappa to annoy their own fans

I honestly had no idea they were still together and releasing new material, let alone that they got to #1 due to some campaign (??). They were always OK iirc.

Like, it always seemed to me like music that was obvious and easy to write if you had heard the same records they had, but usually still nice? "Fear Satan" a highlight.

Haven't heard anything since Mr Beast, though.

Its not really important or anything,and its only hearsay, but it would be funny after them hating Blur for being posh it turned out he was.

― Pfunkboy AKA (Oor Neechy)

They hated blur for being shite iirc

I mean, it's definitely not unique to ilx, but I'm surprised sometimes by how many people haven't listened to recent Mogwai records and assum they are still all recreating the dramatic crescendo post-rock thing. I mean, they definitely do still have some of those, but they've also widened their approach pretty significantly over the years.

I haven't heard anything since rock action lol

I wish Mogwai’s music was more dark, I love some of the early stuff

Like, it always seemed to me like music that was obvious and easy to write if you had heard the same records they had, but usually still nice?

Yeah, YT was revelatory to me at the time in showing what it's possible to do with no ideas.

The thing they were good at was zeroing in on these little throwaway cells and phrases and blowing them up to a monumental scale. There was a sense of discovery about it, like seeing microscopic life forms englarged.

I mean, it's definitely not unique to ilx, but I'm surprised sometimes by how many people haven't listened to recent Mogwai records and assum they are still all recreating the dramatic crescendo post-rock thing. I mean, they definitely do still have some of those, but they've also widened their approach pretty significantly over the years.

― a superficial sheeb of intelligence (jon /via/ chi 2.0), Thursday, July 22, 2021 1:34 PM (thirty-three minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

they seem to have switched things up a little after mr beast. nevertheless none of the more recent albums have grabbed me, mind you.

I watched the Vic Galloway stuff in iPlayer when the album came out and it was like early Coldplay. Made YT/CODY seem like revolutionary experimentalism.

Felt that for a long time but the most recent is definitely more interesting. It’s been a bit unrewarding since Happy Songs, with the major exceptions of Hardcore, Les Revenants and this.

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

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

on tv in an hour

ok here we go.
prizes are bollocks of course, still there might be some good performances.
I have heard 0 of these LPs, will be awarding CaAL music prize after hearing them all

Wolf Alice, not sure if IDGI or just bad performance, 3/10

Laura Mvula, good first impression, some great ingredients, hasn't clicked for me but I can feel it will. 8/10

Celeste: sounds a bit like Any Winehouse, but with better arrangements, this was number one? yeah think I like this too. 8.5/10

Hannah Peel. Just great to hear experimental electronic music on the BBC. Would love it if this won, but it has no chance. 9/10

Mogwai: Yeah I loved Mogwai in the 90s, put them on the cover of my zine once. Stuart is singing again! He sung on their first single, still got that somewhere. Good to see the lads doing well for themselves, nice one. 5/10

Floating Point / Pharaoh Sanders / LSO: Sorry, if you can't be bothered to fly an octogenarian jazz legend to London during a pandemic to perform at a crap awards show then you can't get any votes from me. 10/10

Nubya Garcia: this is quite pleasant, I wonder if the lodger knows where to get weed, haven't had any in decades now. probably a bad idea, can't even handle a single doom bar these days, I wouldn't be able to sleep and I've got stuff to do at the weekend. 7/10

lol at "nice one. 5/10"

Ghetts: that's a really big puffa jacket. not feeling this, prog grime, maybe it works better on record, idk. Ocean Wisdom had an album out this year didn't he? gonna check that out instead. 5/10

Sault, represented by Giles Peterson, not sure how I can judge this by having Giles talk about their run-off messages. VOID

Black Country, New Road: I have heard this group before and still think they could be very good indeed if they could just get that man to stop singing. 7/10 but docked 10 points for bad choices, -3/10

Can Lauren put out an album? The EP in 2001 was good, she can't be that busy with desert island discs.

Berwyn: Feel like a dick judging this very personal stuff, so I won't.

Arlo Parks: something about this venue and its acoustics makes lushly produced music sound like crap. so maybe this is actually really good, w/e I am not going to appreciate it tonight, sorry. 7/10

CaAL Prize 2021 goes to, IDK, I think Hannah Peel?

Alright, well done (winning artist)!

Off to bed now.

Arlo will win this probably

― nashwan, Thursday, 22 July 2021

I get robbed. A lot

— LAURA MVULA (@lauramvula) September 9, 2021

wow!

Of tonight’s performances: #1 Berwyn, #2 Celeste (big surprise as her album annoyed me)… #11 Laura Mvula, #12 Mogwai.

2022 Shortlist

The Shortlist for the 2022 Mercury Prize with @FreeNow_UK has been revealed! 🏆⚡️@fergusmccreadie@gwennosaunders@Harry_Styles@buckleyxbutler@JoyCrookes@KojeyRadical@LittleSimz@NovaTwinsMusic@SamFenderMusic@SELFESTEEM___ @wetlegband@YardActBand#MercuryPrize pic.twitter.com/VbIV8nubON

— Mercury Prize (@MercuryPrize) July 26, 2022

I knew Nova Twins would be on it on Sunday, because I was playing cricket with their label supremo, lol

(he is also Self Esteem's supremo, and Bridgers etc)

(btw what a truly abysmal collection of music, I did promise to check out Nova Twins tho)

Nova Twins FTW

(btw what a truly abysmal collection of music, I did promise to check out Nova Twins tho)

― imago,

Best list in years.

Yard Act alone invalidate that!

I do also need to hear the new Gwenno actually

Nova Twins are great and my favourite of the lot, but I wouldn't think their nu-metal would win over critical & popular faves like Little Simz or Wet Leg or Harry Styles.

yup, they almost certainly have zero chance, but will win in my dreams.

Not sure who's favourite with the bookies but could.easily see the judges giving it to Self Esteem