The Mercury Music Prize - A musical Chachi

Now lets get this clear from the start.  I don’t blame the Mercury Awards, like all of us, it just wants to be cool, it wants to be the Fonz.

It may even have the hall marks of cool, but you just can’t help feel, that if the Mercury Music awards gave a broken down Jukebox a methophorical punch, neither chicks nor record buyers would come flocking.



I mean just look what the national press had to say about it.



“Elbow, the journeymen of British Indie music, showed that perseverance can pay off last night, as they scooped the Nationwide Mercury Prize, the nation’s foremost music award,” stated the Times.

“Elbow saw off hot favourite Burial, a south London-based producer who revels in his own anonymity and refuses to partake in interviews or be photographed.”



Two things are immediately striking about this, the first of course is that your having to take the opinions of a Times reader and secondly, surely any musician sold on anonymity would not be particularly enamoured with an industry award, even if he does get to meet Jools Holland. 



For all its good intentions, the whole thing is just ludicrously ambitious. I mean, any award that in a single year can pit Roni Size, Beth Orton and the Spice Girls (1997 contenders) against each other gets full marks for eclecticism, but can’t possibly live up to its billing.



It’s an unfortunate fact that, with the exception of the Fonz of course, nothing pertaining to be cool ever is.



This is not to take away Elbows achievement, their sweet mix of overtly emotional, melodic heartfelt rock, deserves to be held in the same esteem as Sporty, Posh and Ginger’s best output like Mama, Stop and the Power of Five.



But, in trying to cater for everyone’s tastes, the awards’ notion of witling its contenders down to best album of the year is like comparing, well, Robert Plant with an anonymous producer from South London.



Being varied in your musical tastes may work in someone’s record collection, but trying to match the merits of Elbow to the more chart topping R&B of Estelle is grossly unfair. 



Surely for the awards own sake, the Spice Girls or any other outright pop album would not be allowed to beat Robert Plant or Elbow.



You never caught the fonz changing into dinner jackets to impress anyone, or curbing his womanising ways, because anything else quite frankly wouldn’t be quite as cool. No, if youwanted that sort of malarkey you needed his cousin, Chachi.



Its not a criticism you understand, its just that you always felt that the Fonz knew what he was about, birds, bikes and “aaay”, as for Chachi well Joanie loved him, but where’s the catchphrase?  I’m sure Jules Holland knows better, but then he can go and ‘Sit on it.’

The author wishes it to be known that he has not been listening to all contenders in this year’s Mercury awards, but that he has been watching a lot of Happy Days.

Posted In Features, Sep 18 2008. Words - Neil