UK MC Speech Debelle’s Speech Therapy was named the winner of the 2009 Mercury Prize this evening; Debelle’s debut album bested offerings from fellow UK citizens like Bat For Lashes, La Roux, and Florence and the Machine, among others. Meanwhile, the singles-centric Popjustice Twenty Quid Music Prize, which also had quite the competitive field, was nabbed by Girls Aloud’s sterling “The Promise,” because come on, it’s amazing, how could it not?? (Full disclosure: I voted for it.) Clips from the winners after the jump! MORE »
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everybody's a winner
Britain Is Awash In Music Prizes Tonight
everybody's a winner
Miley Cyrus: Still The Teens’ Choice, At Least For Now
Miley Cyrus, Jason Mraz, Taylor Swift, and Paramore were the big music-related winners at the 2009 Teen Choice Awards, which were presented last night and will be shown in all their glory on Fox this evening. Britney Spears took home a lifetime achievement surfboard—known as the Ultimate Choice Award—for her contributions to kiddie culture over the course of the award show’s 11-year lifespan. Cyrus, meanwhile, grabbed six boards. That tally includes an award for “Before The Storm,” a collaboration with the Jonas Brothers that is apparently the official song of the summer for those young people motivated enough to vote on these sorts of things. Talk about generational divides! The full list of music-related winners after the jump. MORE »
everybody's a winner
2009 Video Music Awards Nominations
Nominees for the 2009 Video Music Awards, which will be presented on Sunday, Sept. 13 in New York City:
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everybody's a winner
Danny Gokey Already Moving On To The “Wedding Singer” Phase Of His Career
Are you getting married soon? Does your guest list have a low quotient of dorky uncles who will dance inappropriately to “Celebration” and other wedding staples? Well, Ryan Seacrest has the solution for you! The overemployed American Idol host is throwing a “Perfect Wedding” contest in which he’s giving away a full-blown marital extravaganza, complete with invitations, catering, and Tori Spelling appearance. (Oh, Los Angeles.) And the piece de resistance—a reception performance by none other than polarizing Idol hopeful Danny “Screech” Gokey! MORE »
everybody's a winner
Popjustice Continues “Be Proud Of British Music Day” With Its Own Shortlist Of Perfect Pop
Now that the British music establishment has declared its favorite home-grown albums of the year with the Mercury Prize nominations, the cheeky British pop site Popjustice has seen fit to announce its shortlist for The Popjustice Twenty Quid Music Prize, which honors the best British single of the year. The artist behind the winning song gets twenty pounds, and the voting is decided by you! (And me, and anyone else.) So all you commenters who want to avenge Lily Allen’s being left off the Mercury Prize list can. Other nominees include the Pet Shop Boys’ “Love Etc” and Saint Etienne’s “Method Of Modern Love”; I’m probably going to throw my weight behind Girls Aloud’s “The Promise,” what with it being completely overplayed (yet not played enough) by my assortment of digital-music players in recent months. All the nominees, after the jump! MORE »
everybody's a winner
The Mercury Prize Honors Most (But Not All) Of The Best British Albums Of The Past 12 Months
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. The nominees, and representative videos, after the jump. MORE »
everybody's a winner
Justin Timberlake Gets A Very Special Emmy Nomination Box
Nominees for the 61st annual Emmy Awards were announced this morning, and while 30 Rock came away with the highest number of overall mentions, we should probably extend a bit of congratulations to the increasingly multitalented Justin Timberlake, who walked away with three nominations—two songs he contributed lyrics to received Outstanding Original Music honors, and he was also tabbed for a Outstanding Guest Actor In A Comedy Series nod in honor of his stint guest-hosting Saturday Night Live. The two songs that Timberlake had a hand in, and some of their competition, after the jump. MORE »
everybody's a winner
Oscars Ready To Give Up On Finding A Best Song Nominee
When the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences announced last week that the nomination field for Best Picture would be expanded to 10 nominees, I joked to some friends that the corresponding move of eliminating the Best Original Song category would be removed “to save time in the broadcast, and also because it’s really hard to get people to agree on nominating a song not by Randy Newman.” Turns out my gallowsish humor wasn’t that far off, according to a report in Variety–new rules for the category will tweak its already-limiting mathematical formula in such a way that it’ll be possible for there to be no nominations in any given year. According to the trade rag: MORE »
everybody's a winner
Canadians Very Impressed By Nickelback’s Ability To Destroy Historic Structures
Is the clip for Nickelback’s “Gotta Be Somebody” a good video, or merely a testament to the fact that adding a dash of the Killers’ synthy pomp to the Canadian band’s grunge-lite formula is the last, best way to get some sort of consensus among rock fans? Or is it just a sign that the fisticuff-enhanced MuchMusic Video Awards, which named it “Best Video,” wanted to give as many awards as possible to the bands performing on last night’s show? (See also: Lady GaGa, Black Eyed Peas, Jonas Brothers, Billy Talent, and the, um, Genesis-sampling hip-hop artist Classified.) Decide for yourself, after the jump. MORE »
everybody's a winner
Taylor Swift Lives Out American Teenagers’ Rite Of Passage With T-Pain
As far as joke rappers go, Taylor Swift–who performed the above “Thug Story” with the ever-Autotuned T-Pain as part of last night’s CMT Awards–falls somewhere between Fred Durst and Rappin’ Rodney. Swift picked up two trophies for her actual “Love Story” clip, and the video’s director Trey Fanjoy also picked up the Director Of The Year award. The rest of the night… well, I’ll bet that even those of you with the most cursory knowledge of country music can probably ballpark the other artists who emerged victorious from the fan-voted proceedings. (One hint: Ginormous breakfasts!) Full list of winners after the jump. MORE »
