The Mercury 2014

I don't know what compels me to keep writing about the Mercury Prize each year, as if it actually matters anymore than any other list of the best albums of the year, whether it NME's, Uncut's or Fearne Cotton's. I suppose it's a triumph of brand management that it seems like it's the prize that ought to matter to "serious music fans", 20-odd years on. It got it right in its first couple of years, with Screamadelica and Suede, such that it felt like something actually worth following, then actually got it right the next year too, in a way, by getting it so wrong in going for Elegant Slumming by M People rather than Parklife. Look, we're a bit rogue, we're not indie as such. Very clever.

This year, I've had more interest than most because I think it's been the best year for British music in a long time. I already got my humphing out of the way when the shortlist was announced as, in my slavish devotion to middle-aged Celtic white men, I am quite convinced that the best British albums of the year by a mile are American Interior by Gruff Rhys and The Cellardyke Recording and Wassailing Society by James Yorkston (with an honourable mention for From Scotland With Love by King Creosote and Futurology by the Manics). None of them got a sniff and the only middle-aged representative was Damon Albarn's first solo album Everyday Robots. Now, if this had been the album for which Albarn finally won the Mercury, that would have been some travesty. It's a nice album, interesting to consider, a bit boring to actually listen to, about the 8th or 9th best album he's ever been involved with.

In the end, I think this may be one of the years where they got it just about right. My complaint with the shortlist was that it was a very urban, hip, Anglocentric thing with little regard for the outposts  (no wonder all the Scottish musicians want independence!)  but then, they've given the prize to a Scottish-Nigerian-Liberian hip-hop trio, so, you know, fair enough.

And it's really good. DEAD by Young Fathers. Really enjoyable and varied and compelling and it's a new sound and really does seem to fulfil the remit of exposing an obscure album which actually does have commercial potential to a wider audience. I've listened to it a couple of times and I'll listen to it plenty more. A tick for Mercury. I wouldn't have liked it if Albarn had won, nor the bookies' initial favourite, Everybody Down by Kate Tempest which is a story-based concept album by a poet-rapper which I don't think quite works as it only stands as an entity all the way through, none of the songs are great in their own right, and though the wordsmithery is neat, it's hardly a riot of the imagination and of beautiful and stylish wordplay, it's led by story, and ultimately it's just a bit like A Grand Don't Come for Free by The Streets, which means that it becomes annoying and unlistenable after about the 5th listen. I've been a bit negative, a major talent, but I just don't think it quite works as an album. More varied music, more proper songs, that's all that's needed.

And the other favourite was LP1 by FKA Twigs, which is really good and would probably have been a worthy winner. Will be interesting to see if she remains a hipster's favourite or actually gains commercial success. It's austere, slightly frightening R and B, the album holds the interest all the way through and has some standout songs.

OK, that's this year. Let's look at the Mercury in general. Does it get it right or wrong more often? Is there any point to it? What's wrong with it? People sometimes criticize it on genre, say there's never any metal, too much jazz which doesn't win, not enough commercially successful stuff. I don't really care about that - I expect the motivation is true and it genuinely does try to just select the best albums it hears. And as the chairman of the panel said, it's tricky with metal because if you don't love it, you kind of hate it and think it's completely fucking lame, that seems to be the unfortunate truth. There's not much of an in-between in a way that isn't true of other musical forms. For those superhip, oh-so-open-minded folk, hip-hop, indie, r'n'b and jazz we don't actually listen to are surprisingly comfortable bedfellows.

Yes, I think it suffers for being judged by music journalists only in that, having read music journalists obsessively for a couple of decades, they really are constantly trying to be cool, so the list and winner does really always try to be cool. I mean, honestly, let's talk about Gruff Rhys for a second. Two Gruff Rhys albums ever have been nominated and one of them is Neon Neon? Serifuckiously? Cos it's electro and ironic? One King Creosote album?  Diamond mine? Cos it's a bit electro? Total ballbags, obviously.

I look at the list of winners and, funnily enough, there's only one of all 23 of them that I unambiguously love, and that's the somewhat inconsequential Hour of the Bewilderbeast by Badly Drawn Boy, which probably folk might in general might see as a judging mis-step, but just happens to be a glorious, beautiful, career-defining album.

There are indie-rock winners which I ought to love, but funnily enough I don't. I wonder if it's chicken or egg? Did I slightly look askance at them because they won the Mercury? I don't think so. Screadamelica, Suede, Different Class, Franz Ferdinand, Whatever People Say I Am, Seldom Seen Kid ... big indie albums, most of them influential, all pretty good, but not personal favourites. I wouldn't say any of them were bad choices though.

There's a real absence of "singer-songwriter" winners - lots of nominees but not winners. I suppose you've got BDB and then two wins for PJ Harvey - I'm surprised 'Stories from the City, Stories from the Sea' won in 2001, it's got some great tunes but it's a little lopsided. 'Let England Shake' in 2011 is really great. Can't really argue with that.

Which takes me to the general lack of winners for the big players of British music, both commercially and artistically. The "breakout/crossover" album has hardly ever won, whether it's What's the Story, 21, Back to Black or something by Coldplay. And the real supergeniuses of British music have hardly ever won, whether it's Radiohead, Damon Albarn, Gruff Rhys. PJ Harvey is the only winner who belongs on that exalted company. I mean, Radiohead never having won is a little daft, isn't it, even if (like me) you're not in complete thrall to them.

So, let's go through it, right or wrong?

1992 - Screamedelica - Primal Scream - RIGHT - still seen as a classic, very influential, very crossover
1993 - Suede - Suede - RIGHT - a hugely influential indie album, which presaged the rock revival of the mid 90s.
1994 - Elegant Slumming - M People - WRONG - joking aside, no one thinks this is a classic album. I can see that they didn't want to get stuck in a guitarpop rut, but no, they got this well wrong
1995 - Dummy - Portishead - RIGHT - almost a definitive Mercury winner, so achingly cool. Can't really argue though.
1996 - Different Class - Pulp - Hmm, equivocally right - I suppose it defines the time, never a big Pulp fan myself, but fair enough.
1997 - Reprazent - Roni Size - WRONG - anyone still listening to this? A nonsense, of course
1998 - Bring it On - Gomez - WRONG - as above. Not a great year, to be fair. Just to be clear,  a RIGHT winner might, I think, either be an album which holds up to history, an album which defines the time, an album which is the start of a major career, something like that. Gomez went nowhere.
1999 - OK - Talvin Singh - WRONG - again, all due respect, but this went nowhere
2000 - Hour of the Bewilderbeast - Badly Drawn Boy - another equivocal RIGHT. I love it, but i recognise that BDB hasn't gone from strength to strength since.Still, history unfairly overlooks this fine, fine work
2001 - Stories from the City, Stories from the Sea - PJ Harvey - an equivocal WRONG, just because there are other albums I prefer on that year's list. Hardly a massive mis-step though.
2002 - A Little Deeper - Miss Dynamite - hmm RIONG - career has gone nowhere since, but it was thought a reasonable call at the time. This would have been a good year for Run Come Save Me by Roots Manuva to win.
2003 - Boy in Da Corner - Dizzee Rascal - RIGHT - a striking album, which kicked off a major career.
2004 - Franz Ferdinand - Franz Ferdinand - RIGHT - a very indie year, this one, but this was the favourite and probably a fair winner.
2005 - I am a Bird Now - Antony and the Johnsons - WRONG - obviously, because it's not a British album. Nonsense.
2006 - Whatever People Say I am, that's What I'm Not - RIGHT - not a massive fan of this, but can't complain
2007 - Myths of the Near Future - Klaxons - WRONG - thought this band were a complete nonsense at the time, history has agreed. Terrible choice. Back to Black could have won.
2008 -  The Seldom Seen Kid - Elbow - I'm going with WRONG - I like this album, but this is an odd choice which unfairly lifted just another album by a very good band. Why bother doing the this year and not other years?
2009 - Speech Therapy - Speech Debelle - WRONG - probably the most notoriously wrong choice.
2010 - xx - The xx - RIGHT - I've tried with this band but they're still like watching paint dry for me. Still, they really seem to define where cool UK music is at these days, for better or worse.
2011 - Let England Shake - PJ Harvey - RIGHT - it's a great album
2012 - An Awesome Wave - Alt-J - WROIT - can't stand this lot, can't stand this album, but I will say their second album has been successful, and, again, the kids seem to dig it.
2013 - Overgrown - James Blake - WRONG - they went tasteful again, and everyone shrugged. If an album's got a singer, and it's got beeps, those music journos they're all over it.
2014 - DEAD - Young Fathers - RIGHT - yes, seems fair enough.

So I think that's 8 right, 5 equivocally right and 9 wrong. It's an outrage! Sack the board! But yes, I think it's time a songwriter album won without beeps. Something simple and beautiful. I predict the winner in 2015 will be Laura Marling with a 5th album which finally brings all her qualities together for a masterpiece.