WORSTEST ALBUM TO WIN MERCURY MUSICS PRIZE!

that's if it's actually as thought out as i'm making out. maybe the judges just liked it a lot.

I don't see why M People HAD to win the prize to acknowledge dance music when the Prodigy were on that list.

"Once Around the Block" is probably king of the "Best song by the worst artist" award, perhaps tying with "When I Argue I See Shapes"

ILM just ate my "surely Prodigy are the obvious winner in that case?" post.

prodigy were way too, well, chavvy for mercury and for people who cared about it in '94. am amazed it was nommed.

haven't heard BDB since it came out but it can't be worse than arctic monkeys, franz, m people, a & the js...

hindsight there

how could they have ignored it at the time?

Shara Nelson – What Silence Knows

har, i remember this! it was pretty good!

m people really don't stick out from the '94 shortlist at all.

i love 'Once Around The Block' but 'The Shining' now makes me want to rename him Badly Decapitated Boy. you know, like, i would take his head off with the hat still on it yeah?

this is the prodigy before keith took centre stage innit? hmmm. still the m people represent more of a break from the previous than prodigy would have been. also they had the soul/ jazzy thing going on, it sort of tips the hat to another, non britrock, zeitgeist.

this is the prodigy before keith took centre stage innit? hmmm. still the m people represent more of a break from the previous than prodigy would have been.

tough call, but i don't think so. jilted is the most badass of all mercury nominated records.

i can only remember the select review of 'jilted', which was saying 'haters still think of howlett as a cheesy quaver but ffs this shits all over everything lamestains'. which was otm but -- i reckon -- a contrarian opinion. this was the year of SAW and 'snivilisation' and 'haunted dancehall'.

Its not that they needed a non-indie record to win. they needed a non-student record to win

ha, difference being?

no £50 man in those days. only students and recent grads liked Blur, Suede and Primal Scream back then.

£50 man would have been buying dire straits and sting then no? i think Filey is 8080TM as much as prodigy are dance they were still much loved by the nme/maker/select axis no? m people represent a break from that consensus.

£50 was a lot of green in those days.

although music was more expensive.

£50 man would have been buying dire straits and sting then no?

no.

as much as prodigy are dance they were still much loved by the nme/maker/select axis no? m people represent a break from that consensus.

yeahbut nme/mm, and even select, were still basically indie in 1994. mercury's constituency was not identical with that world at all. it's for people --and not students so mmuch -- who want an alternative to the britannia music prize -- so they can pick up the hot jams without having to keep up with these matters.

that's what i'm saying they had to make a move to differentiate themselves. without m people winning the criticism could have been that the award was no different than the nme year end poll or whatevs. q was going in the early nineties wasn't it. what would £50 man be buying to before bluasis hit?

Someone find the NME 1994 list.

I suspect, if one album 'broke' dance to indie kids, it was Jilted Generation.

um screamdelica? though i am now refuting what i said upthread. gateway drug?

what would £50 man be buying to before bluasis hit?

this is a key question because in a way mercury helped invent the £50 bloke. yer dire straits/sting/phil collins listeners have the income of the £50 but they couldn't have given a fuck about appearing vaguely edgy by owning the mark ronson or dizzee rascal album. the £50 bloke is tied up with 'middle youth'.

£50 man would have been buying dire straits and sting then no?

no.

actually yes, pretty much. the equivalent stereotype would've still been buying rock has-beens like that.

Kevin appears to have confused "homosexuals" with "event planners putting on a motivational conference for industrial lighting salesmen"

I didn't use the word "homosexuals" nor would I ever. But hey - thanx for the stimulating conversation.

not dire straits. but what i'm saying is no-one thought sting was cool; £50 bloke *does* think he's a tiny little bit cool.

xpost

lol u just did lol11!!

hands up anyone who actually knows a '£50 man' anyway (and do your parents own any of the winning albums from this decade?)

"£50 strawman"

when i say £50 man i just mean 'word readers' basically. never met one -- just imagining their ideal reader.

Guess which artists on the winners list my Mum is most likely to listen to by a MASSIVE distance. Beings with M.

I don't think my Dad would like any of them much, POSSIBLY Gomez, POSSIBLY some of the Franz.

lolrents

<i>um screamdelica? though i am now refuting what i said upthread. gateway drug?</i>

That's rock guys appropriating dance as psychedelia. Prodigy came straight out of rave culture, straight from Charlie, and they dropped this; it's total dance, despite the occasional guitars from Mr Butt. Half my friends didn't understand it AT ALL. It was the year Cobain died and they were getting into Sonic Youth and Metallica. This is not rock songs or instrumentals with a dance sheen.

i think togtq's ideas about cool and middle youth are really important. this list possibly more so than any rave or britpop narrative shows the impulse for gentrification in the 90s. the industries desire to control and market whilst retaining the "cred". was this a 90s thing? this michael bracewell about the 90s book i read argued something very similar, though i can't quite rememberit exaclty.

Didn't think Gizz Butt was on this one? Also re:

yeahbut nme/mm, and even select, were still basically indie in 1994. mercury's constituency was not identical with that world at all.

All of those had decent sized dance sections and there was generally much more coverage of (established) dance acts than there is now. Also I think the Mercury was still finding its feet in 94, its third year - I dunno if people really knew what it was sposed to be about (do they now?)

Also I think the Mercury was still finding its feet in 94, its third year - I dunno if people really knew what it was sposed to be about (do they now?)

-- DJ Mencap, Tuesday, June 19, 2007 4:03 PM (27 seconds ago) Bookmark Link

yeah this is key. tbh '94 was the first year i heard of it, mainly because of all the fuss about blur Not Winning in the nme.

since then everything has sort of got 'closer together' -- nme, britannia, mercury, the broadsheets.

I'm sure Gizz Butt's on one track on JG.

the mercuries possibly represent an industry fight back, now won. they show that the suits didn't want to be taken by suprise again, that whatever hip new yoof culture appeared they'd be cool with it, cos y know they are cool dudes.

i would count myself as a 50 quid bloke in the original sense, not in the 'fostered by Word magazine sense.

i bought word early on, but it settled down v quickly into Mojo lite.

Did the lighthouse family ever get nominated? my god they were shit.

actually they...no, i can't do it this time.

Did the lighthouse family ever get nominated? my god they were shit.

wait until you hear the indie band featuring one of the lighthouse family : Orange Lights

The Orange Lights feature vocalist Jason Hart (formerly lead guitarist with Spiritualized) and keyboard player Paul Tucker (songwriter, one-half of The Lighthouse Family). The Single and the album was produced by Ken Nelson (all three Coldplay albums), Chris Potter (The Verve's "Urban Hymns").

so dreary it has to be heard to be believed.

Yeah, I got emails about them, and studiously deleted.

The Lighthouse Family guy has a pretty good voice. Shame he sings such bland turgid dreck with it. Surely they can't have ever been nominated, not that I care enough to google it.

I had the Orange Lights album (it sucked) but failed to notice either ex-member connection. I've never heard of Jason Hart either, he's just a session musician I guess?

press release quote :
"the time’s right for us. people are fed up with mumbling indie bands. we are all about big tunes you can sing your heart out to."
paul tucker, the orange lights

had me chuckling for many an hour that particular gem.
no doubt in 6 months the Snow Patrol-lite music will be dominating the Radio 2 playlist and we'll all wish we'd kept the cardboard cutout promos (which were very reminiscent of the Athlete debut album promo - should have seen the signs !)

I just rescued it from the dump pile just because of you - I hope you're proud

my dump pile was 'archived' a few weeks ago, so it's too late for me to follow your bravery.

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

Elegant Slumming indeed

ilm in hating inoffenive pop soul more than turgid blues rock shock

"Bring It On", while no blues rock will ever by my favourite music, has a great production, which brings it way above what it would have been otherwise.