Gorillaz
Photo: Virgin

Radiohead, PJ Harvey, Gorillaz and Basement Jaxx are among the artists nominated for this year's Technics Mercury Music Prize, Britain's most prestigious annual music award. The prize is presented, along with £20,000 (approximately $28,000), to the English or Irish act whose album is voted the best of the year by an independent panel of music industry judges. The winner will be announced on September 11 in London.

Gorillaz, the cartoon-band brainchild of "Tank Girl" creator Jamie Hewlett and Blur frontman Damon Albarn, declined their nomination on Tuesday (July 24) with a press statement credited to their menacing (yet fictional) bassist, Murdoc, who called the prize "heavy ... like carrying a dead albatross round your neck for eternity." The band's Virgin Records rep confirmed that the refusal to accept the nomination was — unlike Gorillaz themselves — entirely real.

U2's All That You Can't Leave Behind, expected by many to be in the running for the award, was not nominated.

Last year's prize went to Badly Drawn Boy, a.k.a. Damon Gough, whose experimental folk-pop record The Hour of Bewilderbeast beat out efforts by Coldplay, Death in Vegas and Richard Ashcroft, among others (see "Badly Drawn Boy Wins Prestigious Mercury Music Prize"). Other past winners include Talvin Singh (for OK in 1999), Gomez (Bring It On, 1998), Roni Size/Reprazent (New Forms, 1997) and Pulp (Different Class, 1996).

The complete list of nominees for the 2001 Technics Mercury Music Prize:

• Basement Jaxx - Rooty
• Elbow - Asleep in the Back
• Goldfrapp - Felt Mountain
• Gorillaz - Gorillaz
• Ed Harcourt - Here Be Monsters
• PJ Harvey - Stories From the City, Stories From the Sea
• Tom McRae - Tom McRae
• Radiohead - Amnesiac
• Susheela Raman - Salt Rain
• Super Furry Animals - Rings Around the World
• Turin Brakes - The Optimist LP
• Zero 7 - Simple Things

• Gorillaz
• Radiohead
• Goldfrapp
• Super Furry Animals
• Basement Jaxx

Coldplay
Photo: Eufloria

Coldplay, Ben Folds, Unwound and Sense Field are among the acts set to perform at CMJ Music Marathon in New York in September.

Also on tap for the four-day fest are Clinic, Convoy, Firewater, Charles Gayle, the Get Up Kids, God Forbid, Starsailor, the Mooney Suzuki and Turin Brakes, according to a spokesperson for the conference.

CMJ, organized yearly by the College Music Journal, will be held at the New York Hilton and Towers on September 13-16 and feature more than a thousand artists in 50 venues. Day events include panels, keynote speeches, tutorials and demo sessions.

The festival will mark one of Folds' first solo performances with his new band. The former Ben Folds Five leader will warm up with a brief string of dates in July.

• Coldplay
• Ben Folds
• Unwound
• Sense Field
• The Get Up Kids