Thursday, 6 December 2012

Blog Sound Of 2013


The Blog Sound Poll was first published in 2011.  The concept of the poll wasn’t to criticise the established BBC Sound of list, but simply an experiment to see if UK music bloggers could come up with its own list of emerging artists that was more representative of their community and give the artists that were nominated some extra publicity.  Indeed the idea was to compliment the BBC list in many ways by providing an alternative to compare and contrast.

Last year’s final long list provided some interesting alternatives to the BBC list; most notably it included Alt-J, this year’s Mercury Prize winners, who didn’t feature on the BBC list at all.

The Blog Sound of 2013 poll has expanded with 49 UK blogs nominating their 5 favourite emerging artists.  Just over 170 acts received at least 1 vote.  The winning act received votes from around 25% of all bloggers. 

The long list represents the very best of new music and draws from major label, indie label and completely unsigned acts.  The likes of Haim may be featuring on a lot of new music tip lists at the moment, but the Blog Sound poll also highlights lesser known bands such as Curxes and Randolph’s Leap, bands that do not have big PR representation, and this is what makes the Blog Sound list fascinating and exciting.

The poll was organised by Robin Seamer (Breaking More Waves) and Andy Von Pip (The Von Pip Express).

“Each blog was allowed to vote for five acts and the diversity of the nominations was staggering. Based on the evidence of the spread of votes anyone that says that music bloggers are sheep and are all writing about the same artists has got it wrong.  However, the results of the poll show that certain artists do have a lot of support and love from a significant portion of UK bloggers and those artists make up the Blog Sound of 2013 list,” says Robin.


The Nominated Artists For The Blog Sound Of 2013 

AlunaGeorge - Infectious R&B influenced pop from London


Curxes  - Dark industrial-pop electronic duo from Brighton and Portsmouth


Chvrches – Scottish electro pop trio formed from a variety of other bands


Daughter – Minimal / ambient sounding folk


Haim – Classic rock from LA with pop sensibilities


Laura Mvula – Jazz / soul singer hailing from Birmingham


MØ – Hip soulful female vocal electronic pop from Denmark


Palma Violets – Raw and energetic indie rock band


Pins – Edgily cool and raucous all female indie band from Manchester


Randolph’s Leap – Glasgow based indie folk pop with a twist of brass


Rhye – Smooth and blissful pop duo


Savages – Intense post-punk with female vocals


Seasfire – Modern rock band from Bristol who mix electronic beats with guitars


The Neighbourhood – Atmospheric Californian 5 piece rock / pop band 


Tom Odell – Piano based singer songwriter originally from Chichester


The 49 blogs who voted in the poll are:


Shortlist and winner announced 3rd January 2013 !

Get involved on Twitter using hashtag #blogsound2013

Personally I'm happy to see two of my five nominations make the long list, in the shape of Randolph's Leap and CHVRCHES.  As a Scottish blog focusing on Scottish music, it's great to see these two representing for north of the border.  However, the whole concept is far from patriarchal championing and the long list has thrown up a few bands I've heard of, and some I haven't, and shown the UK blogging scene has a wide and diverse taste, far from all following the same buzz bands.  I'd highly recommend getting stuck into listening to all 15 acts and enjoying the best the UK, and beyond, has to offer.

8 comments:

  1. Only Randolph's Leap from my list made it. Baws! :(

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  2. Right on for Haim and The Neighbourhood! I love those bands and can't wait to see what's next in 2013! Let it Go is The NBHD's best track, in my opinion. Video is pretty memorable too. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l91u752OCPo

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  4. Can you add the Jocknroll website to your list of voters for next year, please? We're at http://jocknroll.wordpress.com

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  5. Robin Seamer from Breaking More Waves is your man. He's the brains behind the Blog Sound. Get a hold of him somewhere in here http://breakingmorewaves.blogspot.co.uk/

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  6. So happy The Neighbourhood made this list- they're one of my favorite break out artists of the year. they are trying to get to the #1 artist slot on Spotify's Emerge App- take a listen to their stuff and help them get to number 1. they definitely deserve it!
    http://open.spotify.com/app/emerge

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