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BBC Sound Of 2012: Something For The Future?

Jamie Milton dissects the BBC's Sound of 2012 Poll, artist by artist.

Posted 5th December 2011, 4:10pm in Blogs by Jamie Milton
Jamie Milton

Jamie Milton

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BBC Sound Of 2012: Something For The Future? Among the 184 tastemakers of influence chosen to stick their neck out and choose Skrillex as the “sound of 2012” were Reggie Yates, the head of Box television and the editor of The Sun’s Bizarre section. Put this into perspective and you’re left with the very minute likelihood of small, interesting acts worthy of future success being collectively chosen as something for ‘the future’.

The BBC Sound of 2012 poll has never, and never will be, a glorious success or spot on prediction of the next twelve months’ success stories. And yet each time round, those who claim themselves to be true tastemakers do battle with the mainstream longlist and claim every single time that something terrible has happened. Complaints tend to range from reasonable ones such as “Why are there so few indie acts?” to the ridiculous; “Why have bands beginning with the letter ‘C’ been so criminally overlooked this year?”

These are all supposed to be acts that will somehow find themselves on a Radio 1 playlist or high up on a festival bill in two years’ time, maybe less. DIY’s extraction of the list will consist not of lining the tastemakers’ taste up with our site (though admittedly, it is a slight validation to see Friends, Jamie N Commons, Spector and Niki & The Dove up there) but by assessing the genuine mainstream potential of the chosen 15.  

First we need to gently shove aside Skrillex from the debate, for here we’ve got a guy who’s already, unfortunately, massive. Whether he’s a genuine human being and not some evil alien sent over to perform social experiments on us all is for a separate quarrel, what’s important is that he gets on average 40,000,000 youtube hits per regurgitated turd. Similarly bangin’ and absolutely immoral is Flux Pavilion who, again, gets hits in the millions for every “large one”. But it’s from the tastemakers mentioned above - the likes of charming ol’ Reggie - who contribute to the appearance of these two. They’re surrounded by people telling them to play the next dubstep sensation, so their parameters for finding out who’s actually worth a hoot are bound to be severely limited.  

Now for the good: Michael Kiwanuka will end up on one of the following:
1) A yogurt advert (note: I keep getting this nagging feeling that he already has)
2) The Radio 2 playlist or
3) A private gig for the Royal Family.

Either way, he’s going to make someone a lot of money because his fluttering, retro style of pop will appeal to a lot of people.

Lianne La Havas, who makes very pretty songs in a fairly original manner, has already flourished under the obligatory Jools Holland introductory gig and we can expect her to appeal to a similar flock to those consuming delicious Kiwanuka.

Dry The River are the only “guitar band” to feature and, similar to the ordeal we suffered with The Vaccines last year, it seems no matter how distasteful their stuff might be, they’re going to end up somewhere because we’ve literally. No. Other. Option. That being said, Dry the River aren’t entirely grim. But I’m fairly sure they’ve emerged out of a cloning factory, built with the purpose of producing boring men with rubbish beards to come together and make a boring band.

The less said about Stooshe, the better. Someone out there thought this lot  - despite their poorly applied, “edgy” use of language and frighteningly bleak lyrical themes - were urban enough to be spoonfed to the public. It won’t happen. It can’t. Not even a desperate David Cameron can back up his “hug a hoodie” campaign by pretending to enjoy this.



Stooshe’s use of the ‘f’ word is churlish and almost completely pointless but fellow foul-mouth Azealia Banks, on the other hand, uses curses as if she is legally obliged to, helping to make her the most exciting hip-hop talent this side of virtually everybody. Appealing to a similar crowd are A$AP Rocky and Frank Ocean; again, really good at what they do and bound to strike gold in America, if not over on our shores.

The question at the edge of my lips is whether or not Friends and Niki & the Dove, both hugely endorsed by this very site, have enough backing to make the crossover from critical acclaim to mainstream adoration. The latter have just made the Radio 1 Playlist, the former have been flirting with it for weeks. Here, we see the good in the sound of 2012 poll, in assuming that it will be the gentle push needed to put both of these acts at the forefront of next year’s new music campaign. Both deserve it. Both will be loved - you can see Friends’ songs being sung by giddy teenagers and Niki & the Dove have genuine potential - so it’s just a case of crossing our fingers and hoping the right people give their songs the right kind of backing.
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