The Lex 20p Indie Prize 2008

[katstevens.livejournal.com]

It's that time of year again!

We want your nominations for the 4th Annual Lex 20p Indie Prize shortlist!

[Poll #1252320]

Nominations will close at lunchtime on Thursday, and the final poll will be posted soon after (remind me if I forget!), with the winner announced next week.

Last year's winner was Art Brut, beating the Arcade Fire and Mark Ronson. As ever, the definition of 'indie' is up to you but nominations should be vaguely kept to acts that have released something in the UK in the last 12 months (if you get stuck for ideas here is the Mercury Prize nominations thread).

Comments

[koganbot]

No, being merely actually indie doesn't make you indie (and are you sure they're not going to be distributed by a major? that's the criterion by which Billboard declares you independent, if you're not distributed by a major)

[katstevens.livejournal.com]

Hence Steps and Britney being at the top of the indie charts AT ALL TIMES between 1998-2000 etc :)

[piratemoggy.livejournal.com]

No major involvement whatsoever; they've set it up all by themselves as far as I can tell, bless'm.

Idk, they are quite indie in a way. Lex probably hates them, too. It is stretching the point a bit though probably.

[whalefish.livejournal.com]

But half the stuff we're nominating isn't indie in any sense! So I figured I may as well chuck them in.

I'll probably end up changing my mind again.

[koganbot]

I think that almost everything nominated is indie in some sense, either stylistically and in loosely related sensibility; hard to put a finger on what that sensibility is, since the sensibilities are only loosely related - and bear in mind that I think that poptimists is indie, not in its taste (which of course varies from person to person, and there are definite aesthetic arguments and tensions among us, and in some ways what unites us is participating in similar arguments rather than all holding similar views, but there are a similarities and common touchstones, too), but basically by being a part-time boho niche of poorly paid or unpaid critics with a critical stance towards the mainstream of criticism and journalism (a lot of the mainstream being, paradoxically, pro-indie rock in its attitudes and predilections). Bands like the Arctic Monkeys (for instance) veer towards a different kind of institutionalized boho than we do, but there still are family resemblances here and there, at the minumum I'm guessing a similar social liberalism. And acts like Annie and Robyn and Alphabeat and the Knife and Teddybears STHLM are indie in that they resemble us socially, sort of the left bohemia of dance-pop, and though I think some of them create beautiful music sometimes, they tend to sound a lot less vital than Rihanna and Cassie and Britney and ilk, who usually do way better than mere beauty. (But it's not a given that acts who resemble "us" socially must be less vital than acts that don't.)

[koganbot]

either stylistically OR in loosely related sensibility

there are a similarities