E Y E W E A R, THE BLOG - FREEDOM MEANS BEING UNAFRAID TO WRITE WHAT YOU THINK

The Mercury Prize, 19 years old, has had a mixed past.  It's chosen duds, and brilliant albums.  What it has done is select the 12 "best" albums of popular music each year, made in Ireland or Britain, from an eclectic genre-list, of avant-jazz to hip hop to nu-folk, and all stops in between.  Famously, PJ Harvey , who won again last night, making her the Don Paterson of the music world, first won exactly a decade ago, on September 11th.  That time, the album was Stories From The City, Stories From The Sea , her finest work, until Let England Shake appeared earlier this year.  It is, as I have written earlier at Eyewear , an album for the ages, one crafted with the sort of literary intelligence we normally associate with poets.  Speaking of Englishness in the context of war and empire, it could not have come at a more apt moment, and to win on the eve of the first decade of 9/11 is an unusually satisfying cultural moment of deserved recognition. ...

The xx has won this year's Mercury prize.   Eyewear has long appreciated this band - well, since they came out a little over a year ago.   The xx are the most sonically original British band in a decade, and perhaps the most melodically spare and intriguing - by marrying post-punk guitars to an urban spoken delivery (that also echoes Lou Reed ) they manage to represent the traditions of The Beatles, The Smiths, Nirvana , but also the current  dark landscape.  Their debut album is awfully beautiful, very haunting, and keeps a curious distance - emotive but cool, like Portishead was.  This is an example of timeless artistry, that, whatever they do next, cannot stale.

The Barclaycard Mercury Prize has had its shortlist announced yesterday, and Eyewear is pleased to see a few of its faves in contention: Paul Weller 's Wake Up The Nation and The xx 's xx album.  Also particularly good are The Foals and Laura Marling .  Strong field.  I predict The xx will win.  They're one of the most striking and refreshing bands of the last decade in the UK.