Each has its own voice and handwriting. Insight into the albums nominated for the “Austrian Award” / Article

“Austrian Award” annually compiles the albums released during the year, primarily assessing the quality of the albums. This year, due to special circumstances, the nominees for the “Austrian Prize” were announced at the beginning of the summer and instead of ten albums, twelve were selected. –

The recordings for the “Austrian Prize” are evaluated by local music critics, journalists, viewers and DJs, giving the listeners a starting point from which to start their listening journey in the latest Latvian music.

Albums nominated for the 2021 “Austria Award”:

The nominated albums are stylistically different, but they also have something in common – first of all, each has its own “voice” and handwriting. Secondly, the evaluation already received by listeners and music viewers.

Half of the nominated albums have already received “Golden Microphone”, as well as some have gained some kind of recognition abroad. How to decide the best?

When the style of music as a concept has only the meaning of a stopping point (we create our samples in digital music streams to our liking, not stylistic purity), then two elements remain for evaluation – the abilities of the artist’s master and the talents of the artist’s narrator.

To a large extent, musicians can be considered a craftsman who manages his instruments, but he is made an artist by the ability to realize an idea, to tell a story – a personal journey, to record current events.

Feeling vibrating in the air

Will Ansis with the album “Great Art”, which has already won the title of the album of the year in the “Golden Microphone”, receive the “Austrian Award”? The works of the rapper’s duck have been worked on and are relevant, including the album “Great Art”. It is dynamic, with new solutions both in music production techniques and in its lyrics, thus always setting a higher quality bar for others as well.

Tesa, on the other hand, has broken the boundaries of style with the album “Control”. Of course, post-metal experiments with sound, its volume and effects are still at the center, but combined with visual projections, the album has become an audio-visual work of art.

The current pain of the era has been captured by the group “Židrūns” in their album “Kovārņu grandchildren”. The album could be classified as a post-bank both musically and textually, poetically leading to social reflection on us as a society. Alise Joste also tells about the current situation – distance, loneliness, apathy through real life scenes with the album “Šākāta”. But the debutant ŪGA with the album “LG is HH” in a modern way, through a bit of hip hop, actualizes the Latgalian language. Meanwhile, the band’s recent album “It Will Be Long” once again focuses on the rumbling post-rock sound, creating a contrast to the sensitive lyrics, thus showing the ambivalence of our sense of time.

Get to know a new world

Music gives you the opportunity to experience feelings and get to know worldviews that we will never experience in our lives. For example, the album “Salt” from the group “Ezeri” invites the listener to an abstract, idyllic world, where indie music merges with the noises of free jazz. The album “Avalanche” by Arthur Skuteelis and “Tverumi” creates an atmosphere of a psychological mystery thriller, where you want to feel the main character, although you realize that maybe you shouldn’t do better.

The band’s album “Dialogue” is a synthpope that offers to travel back and forth in time in the form of exquisite references. The indie music of the band “Stūrī Zēvele” album “Labvakar” will open the door to the world of poetry. Domenique Dumont’s album “People On Sunday” stimulates the listener’s imagination with its minimalism. The artist “Sign Libra” with the album “Sea to Sea” conjures up a fantastic world of sounds or ocean, combining tradition with a vision of the future.

Which of the 12 will have resonated the most and will receive the “Austrian Prize”, we will find out on the morning of June 16 in LR 5 “Pieci.lv” program “Five Morning”. I hope the result will surprise me!

–