popwreckoning

The nominations for the 2010 Barclaycard Mercury Prize – awarded to the album deemed the best released during the prior year from the United Kingdom and Ireland – were announced earlier today, July 20, at a London ceremony by BBC 6music radio host Lauren Laverne. You may recognize several of this year’s nominees as acts previously featured on PopWreckoning.

Here are the 12 nominees for this year’s Mercury Prize:

Biffy Clyro – Only Revolutions
Corinne Bailey Rae – The Sea
Dizzee Rascal – Tongue N’ Cheek
Foals – Total Life Forever
I Am Kloot – Sky At Night
Kit Downes Trio – Golden
Laura Marling – I Speak Because I Can
Mumford and Sons - Sigh No More
Paul Weller – Wake Up The Nation
Villagers - Becoming A Jackal
Wild Beasts - Two Dancers
The xx – xx

Receiving a Mercury Prize nomination (and/or winning it) generally leads to increased album sales and increased celebrity profile for a band. London rapper Speech Debelle received the honor in 2009. The 2010 Barclaycard Mercury Prize will be awarded in London on September 7. The winning act will receive a cash award of £20,000 (over $30,000 US).

Make no mistake, Corinne Bailey Rae is no Norah Jones, and that’s a compliment–with no disrespect to Miss Jones. Forging a genre is difficult at best, mostly unintentional, and sometimes just damn right needed, and on her new album, Rae is out the gate once again with both bold determination to change the landscape of sound and emotion, coupled with a risque and sexy movement. The Sea is a compilation of innocence lost and sweet nights in Paris.
Deeply layered with sadness, “Are You Here” flows through with a sometimes “Beatles’esque” hue. She glides in with words like: “He’s a real live wire.” You immediately picture someone barefoot and singing to an empty room, but knowing a ghost is present. When she is repeatedly asking, “Are you here,” it’s a soft scream for love lost and remembered.
One of Rae’s most igniting talents is her ability to change it up on a dime. Three tracks into The Sea and she introduces us to her sultry zones. “Feels Like The First Time” literally transports one to a hot night in June, in a nonair-conditioned night club. Time slows and you can feel the sweat drip from your pores as you move with her in her lust for the feeling of days gone by.
“The Blackest Lily” is an adventure. It’s the track you play on a Friday night before you’re about to intentionally get into some serious night wandering. It’s a free pass to go break some hearts with wreckless abandon. The infusion of simple guitar with psychedelic funk is a true throwback, but it feels brand new.
But Corrine Bailey Rae is still able to help us have an innocent fun, in “Paris Nights/New York Mornings” she has that lighter side that made us fall in love with her landscape. It’s a day in the life of someone who enjoys the very air she breathes, while paying attention to it all. It reminds us that it’s important to remember how good life can be as she courageously states, ”We were young, we were young and we didn’t know.”
To be “present” is bold, risky and sometimes a bit damaging. But to be “present” and document it, is the mark of a tested and accepting soul. “Diving For Hearts” is for lack of a better term, soulful. It’s a swim through Rae’s journey to understand her own heartbreak. With a raw calm, it questions the fabric that holds and breaks unannounced. Flowing with statements like , “Can’t forget the things I’ve seen” and “I longed for you like the love sick moon, pulls the tide,” Rae generously expounds on a need to be where we are “present.”
The Sea is eclectic, sexy, smoky and real. No pandering to the masses, no holding back due to fear of offense, and most certainly a no holds barred work of art. If we could all have that type of focus and determination to produce quality work, there would be less to be regretful of. But then again, it’s in Miss Rae’s reminders to remember that we can get there, without living in that regret, we can repeat the anthem: ”The sea…cleans everything, takes everything from me.” We break time and time again, but with Rae at the helm, we will always have our “Paris Nights/New York Mornings.”

Track Listing:
1. Are You Here
2. I’d Do It All Again
3. Feels Like The First Time
4. The Blackest Lily
5. Closer
6. Love’s On Its Way
7. I Would Like To Call It Beauty
8. Paris Nights/ New York Mornings
9. Paper Dolls
10. Diving For Hearts
11. The Sea
12. Love’s On Its Way (Live at The Tabernacle, London)