Damon Albarn’s debut solo effort Everyday Robots is among the 12 nominees for the 2014 Mercury Music Prize, awarded annually to the best album released in England and Ireland over the past year.
Also up for the prestigious award, which will be announced on October 29, are Bombay Bicycle Club (So Long, See You Tomorrow), FKA twigs (LP1), Jungle (Jungle), and current band-of-the-moment, Royal Blood (Royal Blood).
James Blake won the Mercury last year for Overgrown.
Albarn has never won a Mercury Music Prize before, despite being nominated three times for his previous bands. Blur was nominated twice, for 1994’s Parklife and 1999’s 13, but lost out to M People and Talvin Singh, respectively, and his Gorillaz were nominated in 2001 only to have the project withdraw its name from the running. That year’s Mercury went to PJ Harvey’s Stories from the City, Stories from the Sea.
Here’s the full list, and check out Albarn performing “Song 2” earlier this year at Royale in Boston.
2014 Mercury Music Prize Nominees
Anna Calvi, One Breath
Bombay Bicycle Club, So Long, See You Tomorrow
Damon Albarn, Everyday Robots
East India Youth, Total Strife Forever
FKA twigs, LP1
GoGo Penguin, v2.0
Jungle, Jungle
Kate Tempest, Everybody Down
Nick Mulvey, First Mind
Polar Bear, In Each and Every One
Royal Blood, Royal Blood
Young Fathers, Dead
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