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Sep 08, 2009 Speech Debelle By Mark Redfern

Speech Debelle has won this year’s Mercury Prize, it was just announced at a ceremony in London. The British rapper was something of a surprise winner and beat out the likes of The Horrors, Friendly Fires, Bat For Lashes, The Invisible, Florence and the Machine, Kasabian, Glasvegas, and others. Debelle took the stage and immediately gave a shout out to one of her fellow nominees. “Big up The Invisible,” she said. Debelle had told BBC 6 Music radio earlier in the evenining that The Invisible were her favorite other nominee. Ironically, despite her name, Speech Debelle gave a short speech. She thanked her label, producers, and family (“my gran’s over there”). The winner is awarded 20,000 pounds and Debelle also said, “Thank-you to whoever’s name is on the check.”

Eleven of the twelve nominees performed at the ceremony in London tonight. Glasvegas was due to also perform, but pulled out due the illness of lead vocalist James Allan. Friendly Fires almost didn’t perform, because drummer Jack Savidge was admitted to the hospital last night, but they were able to perform none-the-less.

The Mercury Prize has been awarded annually since 1992 to best British album released each year and is the most prestigious music award in Great Britain. In the U.K. the nominees receive a lot of media attention and bookmakers take bets on who is going to win and the announcement is broadcast live on British TV. Previous winners have included Primal Scream, Pulp, Portishead, Gomez, Badly Drawn Boy, PJ Harvey, Franz Ferdinand, Antony and the Johnsons (Antony was actually born in England), Arctic Monkeys, and Klaxons. Elbow scooped last year’s award in a verdict that was widely applauded. Apparently, the judges make their final decision just before the award is announced.

The complete list of this year’s nominees were as follows:

Bat for Lashes - Two Suns

Florence and the Machine - Lungs

Friendly Fires - Friendly Fires

Glasvegas - Glasvegas

The Horrors - Primary Colours

The Invisible - The Invisible

Kasabian - West Ryder Pauper Lunatic Asylum

La Roux - La Roux

Led Bib - Sensible Shoes

Lisa Hannigan - Sea Sew

Speech Debelle - Speech Therapy

Sweet Billy Pilgrim - Twice Born Men

www.mercuryprize.com