The Mercury Prize Honors Most (But Not All) Of The Best British Albums Of The Past 12 Months

noah | July 21, 2009 10:00 am

Bat For Lashes’ Two Suns, Florence & The Machine’s Lungs, and the self-titled debuts from Glasvegas and La Roux are among the nominees for the Barclaycard Mercury Prize, awarded annually to the best album from the United Kingdom or Ireland. While there are some glaring omissions as always (um, Micachu?????), digging around for videos by the nominees revealed a couple of new-to-me acts—the hip-hop artist Speech Debelle, the experimental jazz outfit Led Bib—who proved intriguing on first listen. (Oddsmakers currently have Lungs as the favorite.) The nominees, and representative videos, after the jump. Bat for Lashes, Two Suns

Florence & The Machine, Lungs

Friendly Fires

Friendly Fires – “Skeleton Boy” Glasvegas

Kasabian, West Ryder Pauper Lunatic Asylum

La Roux

Led Bib, Sensible Shoes

Led Bib – “Squirrel Carnage” Lisa Hannigan, Sea Sew

Speech Debelle, Speech Therapy

Sweet Billy Pilgrim, Twice Born Men

Sweet Billy Pilgrim – “Kalypso” The Horrors, Primary Colours
The Horrors – “Sea Within A Sea” The Invisible
(This video about the making of the album artwork was the only Invisible-specific clip that was directly related to this album, but this live performance sounds quite promising. The Invisible is a supergroup featuring members of Polar Bear, Hot Chip and Zongamin, and their album was produced by Matthew Herbert; they’re label/tourmates with Micachu, which almost lessens the sting of Jewellery not being nominated. Almost.) Kasabian, Florence Lead Mercury Prize Nominations [Billboard]