The 2015 Polaris Music Prize Long List was announced this afternoon in Halifax, NS. The event was hosted by Polaris founder Steve Jordan with Halifax mayor Michael Savage on hand to help announce the list of 40 titles along with Luke Doucet of Whitehorse, Old Man Luedecke and Elizabeth Shepherd. Dartmouth’s Joel Plaskett performed “Hard Times” and “For Your Consideration" from his 2015 Long Listed album, The Park Avenue Sobriety Test. The event was live streamed on TFO’s BRBR.
In total, 197 titles made the first ballots of the 196-member jury.
2015 Polaris Music Prize Long List:
Absolutely Free – Absolutely Free
The Acorn – Vieux Loup
Lydia Ainsworth – Right From Real
Alvvays – Alvvays
Arkells – High Noon
Rich Aucoin – Ephemeral
BADBADNOTGOOD & Ghostface Killah – Sour Soul
Bahamas – Bahamas Is Afie
The Barr Brothers – Sleeping Operator
Braids – Deep In The Iris
Steph Cameron – Sad-Eyed Lonesome Lady
Caribou – Our Love
Jazz Cartier – Marauding In Paradise
Jennifer Castle – Pink City
Cold Specks – Neuroplasticity
Louis-Jean Cormier – Les grandes artères
Death From Above 1979 – The Physical World
Drake – If You’re Reading This It’s Too Late
Frazey Ford – Indian Ocean
Tobias Jesso Jr. – Goon
B.A. Johnston – Shit Sucks
Pierre Kwenders – Le dernier empereur Bantou
Lee Harvey Osmond – Beautiful Scars
Jean Leloup – À Paradis City
METZ – II
Milk & Bone – Little Mourning
Tre Mission – Stigmata
The New Pornographers – Brill Bruisers
Joel Plaskett – The Park Avenue Sobriety Test
Buffy Sainte-Marie – Power In The Blood
Elizabeth Shepherd – The Signal
Siskiyou – Nervous
Colin Stetson and Sarah Neufeld – Never were the way she was
Various Artists – Native North America (Vol. 1): Aboriginal Folk, Rock and Country, 1966-1985
Viet Cong – Viet Cong
Patrick Watson – Love Songs For Robots
The Weather Station – Loyalty
White Lung – Deep Fantasy
Whitehorse – Leave No Bridge Unburned
Young Guv – Ripe 4 Luv
Listen to all the Polaris Music Prize nominees on the 2015 Long List playlist at: http://spoti.fi/Polaris
The Short List will be unveiled on July 16 at The Carlu in Toronto, and the Polaris Music Prize Gala will return to The Carlu for the third year on Monday, September 21. Aux.tv will once again stream the gala live.
The eligibility period for the 2015 Polaris Music Prize runs from June 1, 2014 to May 31, 2015. An independent jury of 196 music journalists, broadcasters and music bloggers from across Canada determines the Long List and Short List. Eleven people are selected from the larger jury pool to serve on the Grand Jury. They will convene the night of the gala to select the Polaris Music Prize winner.
The Polaris Music Prize will award $50,000 to the artist who creates the Canadian Album of the Year. Courtesy of Slaight Music, each of the nine other short listed artists will receive $3,000. Judged solely on artistic merit, without consideration of genre or record sales, the prize’s past winners have included Tanya Tagaq (2014), Godspeed You! Black Emperor (2013), Feist (2012), Arcade Fire (2011), Karkwa (2010), F@##ed Up (2009), Caribou (2008), Patrick Watson (2007), and Final Fantasy / Owen Pallett (2006).
About the Polaris Music Prize
The Polaris Music Prize is a not-for-profit organization that annually honours, celebrates and rewards creativity and diversity in Canadian recorded music by recognizing, then marketing the albums of the highest artistic integrity, without regard to musical genre, professional affiliation, or sales history, as judged by a panel of selected music critics. The Polaris Music Prize is produced in association with Blue Ant Media. www.polarismusicprize.ca/ @polarisprize
