Potential Mercury Prize 2013 Shortlist???

Alt-J won last year’s Mercury Prize award, beating Jessie Ware and Django Django to the top. It was a close contest but in the end, An Awesome Wave deserved the win. Well, at least some people seem to think. I for one tipped Jessie Ware to win with her fabulous debut album Devotion, Jordan tipped Django Django; however Britain’s best album of 2012 wasn’t even included on the shortlist. I'm of course talking about Spiritualized's beautiful Sweet Heart Sweet Light, featuring string arrangements from Iceland's Amiina. The Mercury Prize award can avoid this if they simply read Music Review Database and understand what makes an album, worth being shortlisted and crowned winner. This isn't about listing the most popular British albums of 2013; it’s about picking the best. Instead of detailing all potential album nominees, I'll be detailing the favourite five, five albums that deserve the possibility of achieving Britain’s best music award - the five best British (and Irish) albums, in no particular order are…

Savages - Silence Yoruself

"It's been a while since a band of this nature has graced our boring music scene. They sound fresh even though the formation was respectfully down to music of the 70s / 80s. Thompson's guitar riffs do not disappoint and Beth's poetic lyricism will leave a mark for years, if not decades. Savages have truly released an astounding debut worthy of worldwide recognition." ~Eddie

Foals - Holy Fire 



"Some of the greatest 90's variances in sound: Screamadelica, Parklife, OK Computer, Emergency & I.. They all share that same understanding in reaching out to the wider fields of musical objectiveness without losing any of the band's human reasoning for such expression. Foals, without question, can now be found alongside such greats as the newest member to that shortlist of artists that have created an album so texturally captivating, yet so comforting in its focus, the resulting delivery from start to finish, is one of a multilaterally coerce - without being authoritative - nature." ~Jordan 

Mount Kimbie - Cold Spring Fault Less Youth 

"Mount Kimbie do justice in demonstrating especially that downtempo aesthetics aren't destined to simply lay by the lounge chairs of many a household, or that more ambient treatments of the synthesized can't have something eagerly awaiting to be revealed in closing parts. For that, their sophomore definitely leaves itself suggesting the duo have introduced themselves to wider sounds. And more-so, where some albums work to reacting to either one of a sub-genre's extremity, Kimbie's skill, as noted, lies in finding that equal middle-ground, without sacrifice." ~Jordan 



Fuck Buttons - Slow Focus

"Fuck Buttons elevate themselves to the top of any and all archetypical ladders of electronic music as both a creationist means of theme as well as human being's testing of another's manner of interactivity and visaged understanding. But the best thing of all Buttons' fifty-plus minute third album, is that nowhere does this album suggest that its themes being offered - that of a frantic search for reason or purpose or even just some manner of understanding - leans itself towards being tarred with the same brush used for those records that are categorically brushed off as merely dark, moody or responsive towards something." ~Jordan



My Bloody Valentine - mbv

"We have grown fond of not actually expecting a third My Bloody Valentine album, and now we actually have our hands on mbv, it's just surreal. Although it may not be as special or ground-breaking as Loveless, mbv shows a different side of My Bloody Valentine. It's the side I’ve been waiting to hear for many years and now after 22 years, Kevin Shields and co can finally sit back, relax, and enjoy the show that is us." ~Eddie


Five potential contenders:
Jon Hopkins - Immunity
Everything Everything - Arc
These New Puritans - Field of Reeds
Vondelpark - Seabed 
Billy Bragg - Tooth & Nail