Beastly boys lose out to The XX (From The Westmorland Gazette)

Beastly boys lose out to The XX

5:24pm Wednesday 8th September 2010 in

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AS a devoted and somewhat embittered Wild Beasts fan it would be easy to decry the Mercury Prize judges for handing out the gong to The XX last night.

I could blast that lo-fi London band for their simplistic, trendy, record xx.

Or I could claim that the judges had gone for a safe bet after picking an unpopular winner in Speech Debelle last year.

But in all honesty, The XX have created a beautiful record that fully deserved to win.

Filled to the brim with haunting, stark soundscapes, it is exceptional.

Romy Madley Croft’s whisper of a voice switches to be ethereal and mournful one minute and eerie and yearning the next.

Boy/girl vocals, stripped down bass lines and wandering lyrics create an atmosphere that will resonate with all - from the moodiest of teenagers to the trendiest of musos.

And it is all packaged in Phil Lee’s intriguing sleeve art, which is reminiscent of Peter Saville’s revered work for Factory Records.

In stark contrast to xx, Wild Beasts’ Two Dancers is a much more complicated beast.

Simultaneously romantic and ominous the primitive themes are tackled with the high-art intellectualism of a much older band.

Singer Hayden Thorpe has often cited his Lakeland upbringing as the reason for Wild Beasts’ brooding romanticism. And with a rich tapestry of Cumbrian poetry, art and music to draw from it would be impossible for a truly accomplished band such as Wild Beasts to produce normal indie music.

But I understand that they are not the easiest of bands to love. Thorpe’s sparkling falsetto can be difficult to stomach on first listen and this may be part of the reason they lost out on last night’s award.

Another reason may be their relatively low-key profile, though they have enjoyed increased publicity since the Mercury nominations were announced.

Whether or not they will now gain the credibility they deserve is uncertain but at least one thing is sure, next year’s follow up to Two Dancers looks set to be one of the most interesting records of the year.