As a counter point to the release of BBC’s sound of Poll results released yesterday. The UK Blog Sound of 2014 Long List has been announced today see below for all sixteen of the nominated artists. (Click on the artist name to access their Soundcloud)
BANKS
Sultry electronic music with a hint of soul from Los Angeles – the only non-UK act on the list.
EMBERS
Cinematic and vast indie rock from Manchester
GEORGE EZRA
Singer songwriter with a bluesy voice
HELLA BETTER DANCER
Dark and fiery indie rock band
HOCKEYSMITH
Genre hopping sister duo from Cornwall
HONEYBLOOD
Raw d-i-y indie rock two piece from Glasgow
IYES
Edgy sweetly melodic pop duo from Brighton
KHUSHI
Endearing East London singer who sits somewhere between pop, indie and folk
LYLA FOY
Previously known as Wall, creator of delicate, brooding, intimate pop
MARIKA HACKMAN
Singer songwriter with haunting folk references
MT WOLF
Dreamy sounding band that combine electronics, acoustic music and ambient atmospherics with near operatic vocals.
ROYAL BLOOD
Brighton duo that play gritty lo-fi rock with attitude
RHODES
Stripped back acoustic singer songwriter
SIVU
Idiosyncratic singer songwriter
SOPHIE JAMIESON
Calm, atmospheric folk musician
WOLF ALICE
Edgy rock band who take references from grunge and indie.
Although featuring only one of our picks the Blog Sound of 2014 certainly showing more of a appreciation for the work of independent artists, than the BBC’s rather tail chasing they’ve just-signed-to-a-major-label-tedious-R1-playlist predictability. Particular picks from the bloggers list are the female fronted edge of Wolf Alice, the widescreen sound of Embers,Glasgow-based twoesome Honeyblood sound very promising and the folkish works of Marika Hackman who has appeared on these pages on many occasions. There are also some new names for us to familiarise ourselves with, we have our own tips for 2014 coming shortly…
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.
The 2011 list contained some interesting alternatives to the BBC list including Mercury Prize winners Alt-J and Bastille who have found huge commercial success in the UK in 2013. The 2012 list was more similar to the BBC list with Haim being the runaway winners, followed closely by Chvrches.
The UK Blog Sound of 2014 poll is the biggest yet with 59 blogs each nominating their 3 favourite emerging artists. It has been retitled to give emphasis to the fact that it is a list created by UK bloggers, although the choices of music can come from around the world. This year however, 14 of the 15 most voted for artists are British.
The winning act and close runners up will be revealed on the 2nd of January in a short list of three.
This list contains a range of artists that have all received strong coverage from UK bloggers over the last year and can therefore be seen to be a good representation of what music bloggers have been enjoying listening to.
The music blogs that took part in the voting were
17 Seconds, A Pocket Full Of Seeds, All Noise, Alphabet Bands, Beat Surrender, Both Bars On, Brapscallions, Breaking More Waves, Brighton Music Blog, Cat From Japan, Daisy Digital, Details Of My Life, Don’t Watch Me Dancing, Dots and Dashes, Drunken Werewolf, Eaten By Monsters, Echoes and Dust, Electronic Rumours, Faded Glamour, God Is In The TV, Gold Flake Paint, Hearty Vibes, I Love Pie, In Love Not Limbo, Just Music That I Like, Killing Moon, Like 1999, Little Indie Blogs, Love Music : Love Life, Music Broke My Bones, Music Liberation, Music Like Dirt, My Band’s Better Than Your Band, My Day By Day Music, Not Many Experts, Peenko, Pop Dodger, Repeat Button, Scientists Of Sound, Scottish Fiction, Skeletory, Sleep In Music, Some Of It Is True, Sound Influx, Sounds Good To Me, Sounds Of Now Music, Sweeping The Nation, The Blue Walrus, The Devil Has The Best Tuna, The Electricity Club, The Evening’s Empire, The Mad Mackerel, The Metaphorical Boat, The Sound Of Confusion, The Underclassed, The VPME, This Must Be Pop, Thoughts On Music, When The Gramophone Rings
