Best song added to Meteor awards

An extra category has been added to the Meteor Choice Music Prize for the first time in its seven-year history.

The Meteor Choice Music Prize Song of the Year 2011 will, as its title suggests, award the Irish song judged by the public as the best of last year. Unlike its Album of the Year counterpart, voting on the song award will be conducted via text and online via Meteor's Facebook page, facebook.com/meteor.

The 10 nominees were chosen by a combination of both the votes of the judging panels (full DOI: I am one of the judges!) and the Irish airplay charts. The nominated songs are Bell X1's Velcro, Cashier No 9's Goldstar,Lisa Hannigan's Knots, Little Green Cars' The John Wayne, Maverick Sabre's Let Me Go, Royseven's We Should Be Lovers, Snow Patrol's Called Out in the Dark, The Coronas' Addicted to Progress, The Kanyu Tree's Radioand This Club's I Won't Worry. The winner will be announced at the ceremony at the Olympia Theatre on March 8th.

"The list is a strong representation of the breadth of music styles and talent of Irish acts," said chairman of the prize, Tony Clayton-Lea.

"Personally, I'm delighted to see newer acts such as Little Green Cars and The Kanyu Tree mixing it with the likes of Snow Patrol, BellX1 and The Coronas."