Mercury winner announced and it's...
Posted by Fraser M on 9 September 2008 - 9:43pm.
Elbow.
Not especially left field, not controversial or even particularly unexpected but bloody well deserved, if you ask me.
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Yep.
Agreed.
Absolutely.
Probably fair
I think the Last Shadow Puppets album was better but not necessarily more deserving. Sometimes nice guys do win after all.
Jaysus
That's the end of them so
Good on 'em
Fine album. Probably the best to have won a Mercury. And fine people too.
I don't like them.
Seem a bit boring. Hate the band name and don't like the bloke's voice. They may well be 'good blokes' but that's never been a good enough reason for me to listen to some music. Plus you can't dance to it. Oh well. Always been a bit uncomfortable with the School-prize-day aspect of music awards.More power to their...ahem...elbow.
I meant deserved
on the basis that they make cracking albums full of emotional tunes that enhance being alive, not whether they're good blokes or not!
I'm worried that
there might 2999 more of him lurking around somewhere desperately in need of that rare commodity "music you can dance to".
Elbow win
Absolutely delighted Elbow have won. Been a huge fan since getting Asleep in the Back on the day it came out. I feel they have been stedily improving and evolving as a band over the years and they are one of the best live bands i have ever seen. Well done Elbow
And
They come from Bury.
More power to their black puddings
They seemed genuinely pleased to have won...
which was rather touching, I thought...
I'm not really sure what the Mercury Music Prize is for, however... just another meaningless back-slapping event really.
Well deserved
Best album of 2008 as far as I'm concerned.
Just getting into their earlier stuff too, and really enjoying 'Leaders of the Free World' too...
Rich
Fan-bloody-tastic
Astonishly good album and the only band I can think of over the past coupla decades who have steadily got better with each album.
Rightly given notices by Word in their 20 Greatest Voices piece, Guy Gurvey is so eloquently and effortlessly lyrical. His voice is such a great inistrument and his lyrics stand up there with the best in the game.
They may be prog-rock indie but I like it.
Congrats lads - you do indeed deserve it.
My bet is..........
2006 - the winner is 4 white indie boys
2007 - the winner is 4 white indie boys
2008 - the winner is 5 white indie boys
I think next year it might be hip-hop's turn.
Better get a bet on...
...Roots Manuva now then.
5 white indie boys?
Will come as a surprise to Pete Turner!
white & indie?
"Indie"? No.
"White"? No.
There *are* 5 of them in the band, to be fair. I suppose 1 out of 3 ain't bad, as Mr Loaf so nearly said...
It's a rare thing
This one is a proper old fashioned quality album: a grower; one where your favourite track changes each time you listen to it; contains a 'classic' track (One Day Like This); a word of mouth recommendation album; not gender-specific; a sales grower that could stay in the charts for months, especially now.
Elbow are a rare thing these days in that their albums have got better each time, possibly to peak mid-career (with this album), like U2, The Beatles, REM, Pink Floyd have done.
I find it a bit dull.
I bought the album and I've wanted to get into it and waited for tracks to get going and for something interesting to happen but for me it doesn't. There's a couple of good tunes, some good lyrics, but my feeling is it lacks something.
Elbow Power
Yeah......I agree, I'm pleased they will receive some recognition at last, but I thought their last album was a lot better. Seeing they've won, I'll give it another listen to it tonight. Would have been nice if British Sea Power won it, but they did well to be nominated. Guess they are just too odd to win!
Good on 'em
They've made some of the best music of the last 10 years. I suspect success won't go to their heads. Garvey was looking to spend his cut of the prize money on some new binoculars for when he goes twitching.
New to Elbow but am loving The Seldom Seen Kid - which next?
Just downloaded the winning album and listened to it and I must so I am most impressed...
What should be the next album of theirs to get?
I refer the honourable member to my earlier answer
Ian - have a look at this previous thread, where this very issue was discussed:
http://www.wordmagazine.co.uk/content/in-praise-mild-expletive
Cheers
David
IMHO
'Leaders Of The Free World' - a bit like Seldom Seen Kid in tone and mood....
Rich
They got it right, IMHO...
...I said here a while back that I felt they should win but I didn't think they would. Their acceptance speech was thankfully less smug than The Klaxons' last year, who genuinely believed they'd 'moved music forward'!
wither the Klaxons eh?
Mind you, having said that, "New Rave" is mentioned on the cover of the new NME
God help us.
Congrats to Elbow. A damn fine album
Well done Elbow
it really is an excellent album.
If only there were a band...
... who went by the name 'Arse' who's musical style was slightly different...
Congratulations to Elbow :-)
They
do claim to have a tribute band with the nomenclature Arse, btw
Starlings
is the best new song this year and Seldom Seen Kid is the best album by a British band that I have heard for a very long time. It is rare in the history of the Mercury prize that the judges get it right. This was such a strong nomination that it was virtually impossible to get it wrong.
PUT THEM ON THE COVER
!
Only
if Guy shaves his beard, apparently
Slightly miffed
they've won. Not because it's a rancid specimen of an album - because it patently ain't. In fact, it's a rather fine concoction of muted beats, folk warmth and some Zeppelin crunch. Rather it's because I drew out £20 on Friday to stick it firmly on their nose to win. But I, er, forgot. My wife has finally stopped kicking me and I'm wishing Burial won......
Conspiracy theory
I also had planned to put some money on Elbow so I share your pain. What prompted me to (plan to) do so was when the nominations were announced, Elbow immediately announced two gigs at the Roundhouse in London for September (soonish I think). It aroused suspicion in me as they had played London on two seperate occasions already this year. I wondered if they had been tipped off that they would win and booked the venue as a celebratory gig?
It
doesn't matter.
S´alright
Good Band, Decent Album, Crap Name
I tend to agree with this
assessment of Elbow - well we can't all agree, where's the fun in that? -
http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/musicblog/2008/sep/10/elbow.winning.them...
Each
to their own yada yada. But they sound nowt like Coldplay. I can't hear a patina of guitars stretched over the flimsiest of melody backing the most earnestly quotidian navel-gazing lyrics. The day Chris Martin writes something of life-affirming as One Day Like This I'll enroll my offspring at Sherborne School.
Well yes agreed
The Coldplay comparison is not really quite right - there is a certain common style or origin of style but Elbow superior lyrically and in musicianship for sure.
Hat doffed
I just think Elbow have a vaster panoply of influences than Chris Martin's two Bunnymen CDs and a Ride album taped off a mate. (Along with the Sting lyric book....)
I came to elbow late
basically because i assumed they were just like Coldplay, Keane, Travis etc plus the name is not inspiring. I heard them by accident and am really pleased that i did. It is lazy journalism in the extreme to compare them to Coldplay - they sound nothing like each other and more importantly the lyrics are a class apart. For the knob in the Guardian to take one line as an example of their lyricism is facile - look at the whole of their output and compare it with Coldplay you snivelling little twat!!
I guess
I was going out on a limb (ha ha) by dissenting from the view of Elbow as a wonderful thing. Clearly myself and the chap from the Guardian don't know our arses from our elbows. My coat's on and I'm already out the door.
Hey Sven
come back. Dissent is always welcome here - heck, I do enough of it...the Guardian chap can stay away for a couple of days tho!
Back
I dare say I shall again find elbow room (groan) for my two penneth worth.
your jokes
are very humerus - arf.
Must
have an extra funny bone (others may well disagree).
YES! So well deserved
I am both shocked and delighted that my favourite band won. It is long, long overdue, and I think they won it for the right album. As much as I love Cast of Thousands, I simply haven't stopped playing Seldom Seen Kid since I bought it.
I burst into tears when they won! How lame is that!
They seemed genuinely delighted, and to see Guy Garvey up there grinning from ear-to-ear was just brilliant. They are a class act, truly humble. THAT is the way to accept an award. Klaxons and Arctic Monkeys take note. Accepting an award when your smashed is neither funny nor clever, it's just stupid.
Well done, guys.
I wholeheartedly agree
...with the above, lainey. But Elbow were surely banjaxed to the extreme on champagne? Did you SEE them trying to have a coherent conversation with Laverne (in the most ridiculous dress ever)?
Garvey's 6Music show
Is the best thing there's ever been on radio at 10pm on Sunday. Perfect music for the day and time. AND he can write things as life-affirming as Newborn, Station Approach and One Day Like This. If he wasn't such a lovely chap it'd make you sick.
WHERE TO NOW????
So the album wins an award, while it sounds like one of those obscure acts on the Pye Prog Label 'DAWN'. In fact listening to it I am sure I heard remnants of one of their compilation albums.
Bring back Heron I say - anyone ever hear their double album 'TWICE AS NICE & HALF THE PRICE'? - The ultimate in countryside recording!