Sewn Up

The wonderful Lisa Hannigan today found herself amongst those in contention for the 2009 Mercury Music Prize, which honours the best UK and Irish albums of the past twelve months. I suspect Lisa will be seen by many as one of the more obscure inclusions on the shortlist for the prestigious award but, in fact, a number of people (including Nialler9) predicted her debut solo album 'Sea Sew' would be strong enough to make the cut.

I'm delighted to see Lisa joined on the list by La Roux, Florence and the Machine, Friendly Fires and Bat For Lashes, all of whom would certainly feature in a shortlist of my own favourite albums of the past year. If you don't have these albums in your possession, please rectify this.

Also in the running are indie-rockers Kasabian (pictured), Glasvegas and The Horrors, who have all drawn rave reviews for their recent albums and were among the names bandied about as potential nominees in recent weeks. I'll confess I have only heard snippets of their stuff but I'll probably investigate further to see what the fuss is about.

As is customary, the list includes a number of slightly less familiar names, with London rapper Speech Debelle and folk group Sweet Billy Pilgrim among the more leftfield nominations.

Although Lily Allen, Doves and Manic Street Preachers had been considered by many as strong contenders for the prize this year, true to the notoriously unpredictable nature of The Mercury Prize, none of these acts even made the shortlist. Lily Allen seemed to get word of her omission on Monday when she tweeted: 'im like gazza, the judges hate me, but the people, dem love me .....'

The full list of nominees (and current betting odds) is as follows:

Florence and the Machine – Lungs 5/1

Kasabian – West Ryder Pauper Lunatic Asylum 5/1

Bat for Lashes – Two Suns 6/1

La Roux – La Roux 6/1

Glasvegas – Glasvegas 6/1

Speech Debelle – Speech Therapy 8/1

Friendly Fires – Friendly Fires 8/11

The Horrors – Primary Colours 8/1

Lisa Hannigan – Sea Sew 8/1

The Invisible – The Invisible 10/1

Led Bib – Sensible Shoes 10/1

Sweet Billy Pilgrim – Twice Born Men 10/1

My gut instinct tells me it's Florence and the Machine's year but there's nobody really on the list that I'd begrudge the win. In any case, we'll have to wait until the 8th of September, when all the nominees gather to perform at a special ceremony, before the winner is announced.