Daily Archives: February 17, 2009
Look out! The BRITS are coming
The BRIT Awards are imminent and once again the nominations have got music fans and newspaper columnists across the country arguing about the nominees and putting forward alternative suggestions. I don’t really care for the BRITS much, Robbie Williams has won the most with 15 to his name and that tells you all you need to know about the ‘quality’ of the awards, but being a music fan I always take a look at who’s in the frame if only to see what the national musical zeitgeist looks like.
This year has thrown up some intriguing battles and a few interesting new developments. In years gone by you could pretty much predict who would be in the frame for best female vocalist, Kate Bush was always named and Annie Lennox didn’t even have to make a record, making the bed in the morning seemed to be enough to get her a nomination, but this year both are missing from the list as a new wave of young female Brits led by Duffy and MIA battle it out for the title.
Other notable absentees include Sting, Mick Hucknall and Phil Collins. I’d like to imagine they are going to be spending the evening watching the show on a plasma screen in one of Phil’s many tax havens, crying into their fine wines, unable to understand why the kids are listening to Mike Skinnner’s Brummie tinged blend of pop, rock and rap and not Sting’s lute playing? To paraphrase Louis Armstrong, if you have to ask why, you’ll never know.
There’s always confusion when it comes to best group, with rock, pop and urban awards all being dropped recently leaving simply a Best British Group category. This year the battle has to be between Elbow and Coldplay with the losers probably picking up best live act as a consolation. The BRITS also recognises international acts and the nominees for Best International Group are the strongest in years MGMT should get it but The Killers, Fleet Foxes or Kings of Leon would also be worthy winners.
