He says it best, when he says nothing at all

So, Alan McGee has shot his mouth off again: this time saying the Brits should be scrapped. The very same man, who in 1996 was 'amused and proud' - according to the brilliant history of Creation Records, My Magpie Eyes Are Hungry For The Prize - when Oasis won three Brits. But then, McGee has made a career of being contrary and shoots his mouth off so regularly you sense he has to be more and more outlandish just so someone will listen. Take That should be shot. Paul McCartney should retire.

Actually, so should McGee. Although I suppose the East Angles Music Prize does in a way agree with McGee in that by doing this, I'm also implying that there's better music out there which is not being recognised. And that's no more evident than in the next category...

Best British Breakthrough Act

(Brits: Florence And The Machine, Friendly Fires, JLS, La Roux, Pixie Lott)

I'm presuming that the breakthrough act has to have released a record last year. Which, of course, Friendly Fires didn't. They re-released their fine debut album in 2009, but really should have been in last year's awards. Florence And The Machine and La Roux I can also understand, and JLS and Pixie Lott make more sense in this category too. But there are better...

The XX

It can only be sales which stopped The XX (pictured above) being nominated as Best British Breakthrough Act at the Brits. Most end of year polls had this London quartet - who recently became a trio - near the top, and rightly so. Their debut was genuinely unique - a minimal, brooding nocturnal soundtrack which fused rock songwriting with a glitchy, electronic, chill-out atmosphere. I interviewed them for their debut single, and they were painfully shy and untrained in the ways of the media. They're on the front of the NME this week, but the very fact they weren't pop stars throughout last year when you sense they could have been, made The XX all the more alluring.

Micachu And The Shapes

My second nomination for Micachu, read what I said about her here

Mumford & Sons

Every year seems to have an indie-folk crossover these days, and Mumford And Sons were 2009's. But there was substance beyond the fashionable sound: despite being alarmingly young Mumford And Sons sounded wise and grizzled beyond their years on Sigh No More. And there's banjo. Gotta love the banjo.

The Phantom Band

Usually, bands don't like to describe themselves, and when The Phantom Band said by way of introduction that they were a "proto-robofolk sextet based in Glasgow' there were probably tongues in cheeks. But it did make a kind of sense. Imagine Mumford And Sons and Phantom Band at a folk crossroads, Mumford taking the winding single-carriageway to more traditional sounds, Phantom heading down the Autobahn in search of more electronic, groove-based thrills. Here's a nice download link to Burial Sounds, the second track on their great album Checkmate Savage.

Little Boots

The second nomination for Little Boots as well. Similarly, you can read what I said about her here.

Next time: Best British Group.

Where are the British Males (in a field, it seems)

So, time for the Best Male Solo Artist in the East Angles Music Prize. First though, a male solo artist who I feel sure will be on the list this time next year: Fyfe Dangerfield.

I must admit to being a bit wary of a solo album from the Guillemots frontman, not least because as much as I often love his band, they can be a bit too exuberant and kitchen-sink ambitious. A bit (whisper it) jazz. But if you ever walked down a Parisian street and saw this happening, you'd forgive them.

Anyway, solo albums written in a week by frontmen with a predilection for such things are usually to be avoided, but Fly Yellow Moon is great - a lovely, and probably more conventional set of love songs than anyone would have expected. One listen was all it took to convince me to see him the next day at The Deaf Institute in Manchester, and the songs were even more stripped down than the Bernard Butler-produced album: just him, an acoustic guitar or piano, and sometimes a couple of violinists.

What's interesting is that he wrote these all these songs in the first flush of a new love, and now they've split up. It makes for a less exuberant Dangerfield than usual ('she needs me,' he sings. Er, no she doesn't) but it suits him. And he played Made Up Love Song on a ukelele at the end. Magic.

What the album and gig also underlined is that there is a real deficit of British male solo artists. American ones, sure, but choosing five for EAMP was really hard. But hey. I've started this thing so I will finish.

Best Male Solo Artist

(Brits: Calvin Harris, Dizzee Rascal, Mika, Paolo Nutini, Robbie Williams)

First, the ones I would have chosen. Probably Dizzee Rascal for making me laugh more than any other pop star this year. Bonkers. And Paolo Nutini saved himself from James Blunt territory with a pretty happy-go-lucky record, even though he sounded like a weird amalgam of Bob Marley and a hyperactive Louis Armstrong. Anyway, on with the nominations.

Jack Penate

It was a real surprise that not only did Jack Penate 'get' dance music this year - Tonight's Today was often dubbed the soundtrack to sunrise at Ibiza - but somehow he was overlooked when the end-of-year lists were compiled. Everything Is New was aptly named: gone was the rollicking indie of Penate's first record and in was reflective, happy pop. So why didn't it happen? I suspect he didn't work hard enough: not enough tours, festivals, visibility. Hope Penate doesn't jack the new direction in just when he was getting interesting. You can listen to it all here, actually...

Richard Hawley

After seeing Richard Hawley twice around the time of Coles Corner, I felt a little like he'd taken his gentle 1950s revivalism as far as he could. And it's fair to say Truelove's Gutter doesn't see Hawley 'go drum'n'bass'. But every so often, Hawley hits the mark: it's a mood thing, I think, and no-one does the battered romantic Northerner better than him. He even looks like Roy Orbison on the front cover.

Zomby

Ok, so there's a possibility this was out in November 2008, such is the murky world of dance music releases. And I admit, it was the title that got me first: Where Were You In 92? Well, in The Waterfront in Norwich or a rave in Great Yarmouth listening to exactly this kind of music. Well, maybe it's moved on and slowed down a little (our American friends filed this under dubstep). It was a guilty pleasure and probably what the kids listen to now thinking they're cutting edge. Either way, I rather liked it.

Jarvis Cocker

Another record only really appreciated from a distance. At the time, when Bonkers was No.1, it struggled for attention. But listening to Further Complications in preparation to speak to him (which I didn't in the end, but never mind), it did stand up to repeated scrutiny - not on a Pulp level, but it was quite nice to have Jarvis angry and (generally) rocking thanks to producer Steve Albini rather than ironic and poppy. And it has the best opening line of 2009: "I met her in the museum of palaeontology/and I make no bones about it."

Bibio

Ambivalence Avenue is Stephen Wilkinson's fourth album, but the first on a record label that told people he existed: Warp. And they were right to pick him up: it's a real jumble of Boards Of Canada-style chill-out, odd cut-up sounds you might expect to hear on a Warp release, and then pretty straightforward folky pop. One I returned to rather often.

Next time: Best British Breakthrough Act. Are there better new bands than Florence & The Machine, Friendly Fires, JLS, La Roux or Pixie Lott?

The East Angles Music Prize

The Kermodes are the excellent film critic Mark Kermode's alternative to The Oscars. The twist is they're awarded to films and actors that haven't been shortlisted. And to be honest, they're usually a better indication of that year's cinema than the Academy's picks.

So having been slightly bemused by the Brits nominations yesterday (er, Pixie Lott for Best Female Solo Artist?), I've stolen the Kermode template to use for music. I'll be taking on a Brit category per blog and announcing the winners of the inaugural and pretentiously named East Angles Music Prize on the day of the Brits, on February 16. There might even be a winner-of-winners award, Costa Book Prize style...

You can even vote if you like, by leaving comments! Anyway, on with category No.1:

Best Female Solo Artist

(Brits: Bat For Lashes, Florence & The Machine, Leona Lewis, Lily Allen, Pixie Lott)

This is where the concept falls apart slightly, as I might have gone for Florence & The Machine too, if only for the brilliant Hurricane Drunk. I can see why Lily Allen and Leona Lewis made the five, even though, really, they only made competent albums that sold well. But Bat For Lashes second album was hugely over-rated, and Pixie Lott is just baffling.

So, here's the East Angles nominations...

Little Boots

I had a love-hate relationship with Victoria Hesketh - the artist we were all told to like this time last year. Of course, she could never live up to the hype and lost out, in the end, to La Roux and Florence in the Great Electro-Influenced Pop Poppets Race Of 2009. Hands does have some great sounds on it - particularly the the gurgling electronics on Click - and Symmetry has Hesketh doing her best Kylie impression. But that was just the point: it was a bit too poppy and eager to please. Still, if you could actually see Hesketh live (she's tiny) then it was all good fun.

La Roux

Anyone growing up in the 1980s had to check there wasn't a DeLorean parked outside every time Elly Jackson's throwback electronic-pop came on the radio - which was a lot. But despite making you feel trapped in an episode of Back To The Future, once the irritation factor of the ubiquitous In For The Kill and Bulletproof had subsided, her debut was a soulful and surprisingly reflective (if rather shrill) album. Last 1980s reference for now (and for my uncle if no-one else), Elly Jackson (pictured above) would have been on the cover of The Face every month, no?

Micachu And The Shapes

At the time, Micachu's Jewellery passed me by. I must admit I was baffled by The Guardian's insistence that the debut album by Mica Levy should have been on the Mercury list last year, and having really enjoyed it since realising that a million end of year polls probably weren't wrong, I've realised why. I was listening to it at work, on headphones, trying to write at the same time. It was absolutely maddening in that context, in the way that one song could be a fuzzily riotous pop song and the next a cut-up, bleepy, beat-heavy experiment in music. Oh, and then there's the vacuum cleaner song. But listen to it properly and it's incredible - adventurous and grimy yet somehow rather pretty and melodic.

Speech Debelle

Poor Speech Debelle, destined forever to be characterised as the victim of the Mercury curse that has afflicted Gomez, Roni Size and Talvin Singh. It's true that winning the prize last year was such a surprise it flummoxed even her record label, who weren't able to capitalise on the exposure in time. She ended up ditching them, and good for her. But enough about the industry. The reason she won was presumably because Speech Therapy was a great, innovative and individual debut - a jazz-inspired hip hop record imbued with proper emotion. It just didn't have any hit singles on it: no bad thing really.

Susan Boyle

Joke. Kind of. I really did like her version of Wild Horses, and while I don't think I'd want to listen to an entire record of SuBo warbling through the classics, as the artist behind the best selling album of 2009 she certainly deserved a nomination far more than Pixie Lott.

Next up: Male Solo Artist. Can I find five better than Calvin Harris, Dizzee Rascal, Mika, Paolo Nutini and Robbie FLIPPING Williams?

Tall Stories

The Wire boxset is mothballed for now, as this is my slightly intimidating current reading list. I'm looking forward to all of them in different ways, but at this rate I won't have time to read Grow Your Own Veg, let alone grow any.

I'm currently (well, obviously not currently) knee-deep in Richard Powers' Generosity. It's proving light relief after the dark melancholy of reading two parts of David Peace's Tokyo crime trilogy back-to-back, which I very much enjoyed but made me feel the need for a bath every time I finished a chapter. I was reading them in prep for an interview with Peace, which I admit to being slightly intimidated by (as you would speaking to anyone who has revelled in so much murder). But Peace was such an engaging, interesting man - and just as appalled by his subject matter as me, it seemed.

Anyway, back to Powers. He's much more of a straight thriller writer than Peace, but with a twist in that he's interested in science and technology. So interested in fact, that he dictates his novels to speech recognition software rather than writes them. Generosity is by no means a literary thriller but it does revel in ideas - it's about finding a gene for happiness and what that might mean for the world.

Talking of happiness, I was really pleased to see my interview with Colm Toibin in The National today. Brooklyn was my favourite novel of last year and it was great to see it win the Costa Novel award. You can read the piece as it was printed, below.

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The Review
15 Jan 2010

Short is sweet

I had a problem with some of the critics' albums of 2009, in particular Animal Collective's Merriweather Post Pavilion, Grizzly Bear's Veckatimest, even Fever Ray's debut album. All three had brilliant moments - Animal Collective's My Girls, Grizzly Bear's Two Weeks and Fever Ray's When I Grow Up are standout tracks of last year. But the records they came from also needed a good edit. Perhaps these bands were more about creating mood and atmosphere than hit after hit, but as Merriweather Post Pavilion crept up to the hour mark, it did trip over into self-indulgence from time to time.

All of which was brought into sharp relief by my first album purchase of the year, Contra by Vampire Weekend. It's a bit early to call it great, just a week in, but just like these arty New Yorkers' debut (34 minutes) its sheer brevity is a real virtue. From Horchata to I Think Ur A Contra, their follow-up is just 36minutes long, and an endearing rattle through the styles that people love to hate a white indie band for appropriating: reggae, calypso and most obviously, Afro-pop. Listen for yourself, here:

Of course, Vampire Weekend are essentially a chart-focused pop band more disposed to making short, sharp three-minute singles than Animal Collective or Grizzly Bear. It's in their DNA, and therefore it's no wonder that a ten track album will clock in at 30-odd minutes. But having said that, my favourite records of last year were The XX's debut album (38mins) and Wild Beasts' Two Dancers (37minutes). The former was a brooding hymn to the nocturnal hours and was inspired by dubstep as much as guitar music. And the latter was intricate, quirky indie rock sung in falsetto. Both, then, exactly the kind of records you'd expect to be taking up an hour of your time - uninterested as these bands seem in hit singles (although in my world, Hooting And Howling is a No.1).

But no, they're tight, focused albums, and all the better for it. Once, all records were this long (or, perhaps, short), confined by the limitations of the vinyl format they were produced on. CDs, with their 78-minute capacity changed all that, and I suppose the digital age means an album can be as long as the band want it to be.

Perhaps the digital age has also changed my listening habits and I'm more fidgety with an album, less used to listening to it all the way through as iPod's shuffle function becomes the norm. But I do know I've been enjoying Vampire Weekend and Wild Beasts as they were intended to be heard: in one sitting.

So don't get me started on double albums...

Happy new year to you all from a distinctly snowy North-West. So snowy and beautiful in fact, that the above picture is not a stock shot, but one I took on Sunday. East Angles was hibernating in December - but we're back with a cultural catch-up and some nice new links (on the right) to interviews with the likes of Sarah Waters, Nowhere Boy and Control writer Matt Greenhalgh, and Barbara Kingsolver.

The interview with Waters was for her new(ish) book The Little Stranger, and it seemed particularly timely as we endure the coldest, snowiest winter I can remember since childhood. There's one scene where a key is thrown into a snowdrift at the eerie post-war Hundreds Hall: of course, the 1950s were when they had proper snow every year. Anyway, it's a really enjoyable ghost story, not least because it might not be a ghost story at all.

So that was pre-Christmas reading: post Christmas it was all about David Peace. And instead of the snow, the oppressive heat of Tokyo. The international edition of Occupied City is out this week and I'm speaking to him about the trilogy soon, so it's a treat to wallow in another one of Peace's murky, claustrophobic worlds. I read The Damned United at the same time as then-Norwich manager Nigel Worthington was teetering towards the sack - while Worthy was no Brian Clough, you did really get a feel for the loneliness of the under pressure football manager.

Music-wise I had great fun doing an alternative Christmas playlist for The National, prompted by seeing Thea Gilmore play her beautiful 'seasonal' record Strange Communion at the new Band On The Wall. By dint of not having a quirky alt.folk version of We Wish You A Merry Christmas anywhere near it, it works rather well as a record to play in January too: particularly, right now, Cold Coming (which you can hear on her MySpace) and her version of Yoko Ono's Listen The Snow Is Falling.

And when the festivities were over, two albums have clamoured for my attention ever since. Lawrence Arabia's first international release, Chant Darling, is out this week and is really fantastic, a mix of Beach Boys, Lennon and quirky indie pop. A blast of New Zealand sunshine should you need reminding that it can get above freezing in this country. Apple Pie Bed won James Milne (for he is Lawrence Arabia) the top Kiwi songwriting prize, and you can see why. In fact, you can literally see why, here (video slightly NSFW - only slightly).

He's touring with Beach House in the UK next month - a great double bill because their third album Teen Dream is the other record that saw me into 2010. It's utterly gorgeous: slow, reflective but never indulgent music to lose yourself completely to. Norway is particularly brilliant in the way it unsettlingly detunes itself but still makes sense.

I began this post by mentioning hibernating. Well, Beach House make music to hibernate to, in the very best sense. I'm off to build a snowman.