When the word went out from all the major labels A&R departments about 18 months ago not to sign any blokes with guitars, it was obvious that everyone was on a “find the next Amy/Duffy” trip.
If you were a “kooky” female with a keyboard, all you had to do was turn up at a label audition and before you even cited your influences as Kate Bush and Patti Smith, you were given a million- pound, five-album deal.
The BBC’s annual “Sound Of” poll (which has 135 industry professionals contributing to it) has now become a strikingly accurate exercise in telling us who will be topping the album charts and filling out the venues in the coming year. Last year’s poll tipped Florence the Machine, Lady GaGa, La Roux and Little Boots; sure enough, the women trampled over all the skinny white- boy indie rockers.
The 15-strong long list for this year’s poll has been released and the winner will be announced in early January. Again the acts “most likely to break through” are mainly women. The labels are finally investing in female acts who don’t feel the need to wave their breasts and pelvic- thrust their way into the charts.
From the weird “bubblegum punk” of 16-year-old Daisy Dares You to the electro-friendly Ellie Goulding (who has already won the Brit Awards Critic’s Choice Award) to the half-Iranian, half- Jamaican neo-soul singer Rox, the feeling is that the days of indie landfill music are over. There are more nuanced and exciting sounds emerging – mainly from women.
The one Irish entry on the long list is Two Door Cinema Club from Bangor, Co Down, who sound a bit like Gang of Four as the house band at Studio 54 (that’s a good thing). Next week the long list will be whittled down to five and the winner announced.
If you're to put all your chips on one of the contenders, it would have to be Marina Diamandis of Marina & the Diamonds, who featured in The Ticketearlier this year, and looks set to follow in the footsteps of Adele and Florence & the Machine. What the 25-year- old Welshwoman has going for her is a strong pop background and a playful, contemporary approach to lyrics. This is in contrast to many in her immediate peer group, who run from pop melodies as if they were a sexually transmitted disease and who tend to get a bit literary and obscure in their lyrics.
Diamandis's calling card is the single Hollywood(view it on YouTube), a delightfully unself-conscious up-tempo affair that plays to her strengths. And she has form: a few singles and EPs, as well as much-talked-about appearances at the Glastonbury and Leeds/Reading festivals last summer. She also put in a great Electric Picnic performance for an enthusiastic crowd.
Diamandis attended numerous music and dance university courses (without actually finishing any of them), and there’s an extravagance about her that is missing from her more serious- minded contemporaries.
She cites Britney Spears as a major influence, but in fact she’s more Roxy Music than anybody else. Her webpage (www. marinaand thediamonds. blogspot.com) shows her
to be witty and self- deprecating, and she’s already had a bit of verbals with Lily Allen (almost a rite of passage for a new pop star these days).
“I don’t want to be compared to anyone with a skirt who has a keyboard,” says Diamandis in a nod to today’s prevailing musical trends. No fear of that, with skewed pop music as good as this.
