M.I.A., Spoon, Swizz Beats Among Shortlist Prize Nominees

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mojo-photo-shortlist.jpgNominees for the Shortlist Prize (America’s answer to the UK’s Mercury Prize for best album of the year) were announced today, and there’s 54 of them, so you might want to get a snack. Shortlist restricts nominees to albums that have sold less than 500,000 copies, which ain’t so hard these days, but does eliminate Kanye. The nominating panel included Gary Lightbody from Snow Patrol, the Killers’ Ronnie Vannuccii, and KCRW DJ Chris Douridas, and after the jump, the nominees, every last one of them:

A Fine Frenzy – One Cell in the Sea
Against Me! – New Wave
Animal Collective – Strawberry Jam
Arcade Fire – Neon Bible
Bad Religion – New Maps of Hell
Biffy Clyro – Puzzle
The Bird and The Bee – The Bird and The Bee
Bjork – Volta
Blonde Redhead – 23
BrakesBrakesBrakes – The Beatific Visions
Burial – Untrue
Calvin Harris – I Created Disco
Dead Heart Bloom – Cheasea Diaries
Digitalism – Idealism
Dollyrots – Because I’m Awesome
Eddie Vedder – Into the Wild Soundtrack
Feist – The Reminder
Fionn Regan – The End of History
Future of the Left – Curses
Gogol Bordello – Super Taranta
Grinderman – Grinderman
Gui Boratto – Chromaphobia
The Hives – Black and White Album
Iron and Wine – The Shepherd’s Dog
Jesca Hoop – Kismet
Josh Ritter – The Historical Conquests of Josh Ritter
Juliette and the Licks – Four on the Floor
Justice – Cross
Keren Ann – Keren Ann
Kings of Leon – Because of the Times
Klaxons – Myths of the Near Future
LCD Soundsystem – Sound of Silver
Le Loup – The Throne of the Third Heaven
Les Savy Fav – Let’s Stay Friends
M.I.A. – Kala
Maps – We can Create
o’Death – Head Home
Of Montreal – Hissing Fauna, Are You the Destroyer?
Parts and Labor – Mapmaker
Peter Bjorn and John – Writers Block
PJ Harvey – White Chalk
Puscifer – V is for Vagina
Robert Francis – One by One
Robert Pollard – Standard Gargoyle Decision
Scout Niblett – This Fool Can Die Now
Serj Tankian – Elect the Dead
Spoon – Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga
Stars – In Our Bedroom After the War
Swizz Beatz – One Man Band Man
The Thrills – Teenager
Underworld – Oblivion with Bells
Wheat – Everyday I Said a Prayer
Wilco – Sky Blue Sky
Workin for a Nuclear Free City – Businessmen and Ghosts

Well, there’s some good albums on there, but The Hives? Anyway, last year Cat Power won the award for The Greatest in a ceremony in June so we might have to wait a couple months for the winner, I guess.

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Readers also told us to just give it to you straight when we need to ask for your support, and seeing how matter-of-factly explaining our inner workings, our challenges and finances, can bring more of you in has been a real silver lining. So our online membership lead, Brian, lays it all out for you in his personal, insider account (that literally puts his skin in the game!) of how urgent things are right now.

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