Just a quick note to see how delighted I am that Villagers (aka Conor J.O’Brien) has been nominated for the Mercury prize. Its just deserved for an extremely talented musician and wordsmith, who I think is one of the best things to emerge from Ireland in years. To get such recognition and coverage in the UK is a pretty massive achievement, and pretty unprecedented. Its also nice to see that The Immediate(his former, excellent band) now have a little bit more of a legacy. He is up against stiff competition though, including Dizzee Rascal, The XX, Paul Weller and Laura Marling. Whilst there are heavyweights there throughout, I can safely say there’s numerous who I DON’T want to see win, i.e. Dizzee, Biffy Clyro, Foals and Mumford and Sons’ awful brand of faux folk. I wouldn’t mind seeing Wild Beasts knick it (Two Dancers is excellent) but I’ll be firmly shouting for Villagers, as rank outsiders. Given little chance, nothing would give me greater satisfaction than a nice shock win. However, he seems to be written off, with the Guardian’s blurb as scant and concise as possible: “The debut album from this largely unknown Irish indie folkster’. Cheers for the plug lads. The obvious money is on the XX, but I’ve always been one to shout for the underdog. Question is, is winning it even any use these days, given the consistent howlers they’ve picked over the years…