Prize haul keeps U2 on top

U2 won four Grammy awards at the US Music Industry annual prize-giving event in Los Angeles late on Wednesday night, consolidating their position as the biggest rock group in the world.

The Donegal singer Enya also carried off one of the prestigious awards, winning in the Best New Age Album category for her work A Day Without Rain.

All eyes though were on the Dublin quartet who, over 20 years after their forming, remain at the top of the global music pile. U2 celebrated wins for Best Rock Album, Best Group Rock Performance, Best Group Pop Performance and Record Of The Year.

All the awards were in recognition of their current album All That You Can't Leave Behind and their ongoing world tour. Lead singer Bono said: "Being Irish, if you get eight nominations and get no awards, they wouldn't let you back in the country. So this is a public safety issue." U2 have won Grammys before, but last night's haul was a record amount for them. It also brought their Grammy total to 14 - a world record for any band. Industry observers point to the fact that no other band besides U2 has remained commercially popular and, for the most part, critically acclaimed for such a long period of time in the ephemeral world of rock/pop music. The band's All That You Can't Leave Behind is one of their biggest sellers over their nine album career and their live show routinely breaks box-office records.

Enya's success came as no surprise. The ex-Clannad singer has always enjoyed huge sales in the US and, rather uniquely in the music world, she manages to sell millions of records while keeping a low personal profile.

The big winner on the night though was the New York R 'n' B sensation, Alicia Keyes, who went one better than U2 by winning five Grammys for her Songs in A Minor album. Other winners included the Oh Brother Where Art Thou? soundtrack album, Nelly Furtado winning the female pop vocal award for I'm Like a Bird and Missy "Misdemeanour" Elliott winning the rap solo performance for the magnificent Get Ur Freak On.

The award ceremony was a welcome relief for a music industry that is troubled by declining album sales, the formation of an artists' union aiming to overhaul the long-term contracts that are the industry's foundation and the growing tendency of consumers to download music from the Internet for free, which the record companies claim costs them billions of dollars each year in lost revenue.