A major UK record company BBC Radio 1 have just published their much vaunted self-fulfilling prophecy list of acts to watch in the UK for 2014. Because we like new music at Cool Accidents we feel compelled to republish it so that UK major record company you the consumer will know what will be big and exciting next year.

In fairness it isn’t a bad indicator usually (except for the year Lady GaGa came 6^th, and the year that UK major record label signed they selected Joe Lean and the Jing Jang Jongs) which is pretty obvious given that it tells you what Radio 1 is going to play and really there’s only 1 record company* radio station in the UK. So the list is a good guide and it tells us what will be cool so convincingly that we, Victoria Juryga and JJJ all came to believe that Haim really were cool and not just Fleetwood Mac redux.  So (drum roll) here’s that list for all you pop kids to write on your schoolbags for the last week of term and say “we knew first”

 

Despite our world weary cynicism we were pretty pleased to see a few of Cool Accidents favourites on the list and we demand recognition for raving to you about Chance the Rapper (go Acid Rap!), the Rudimental friends of MNEK (go the spoons) and Ella Eyre, R&B scenester Kelela and the utterly wondrous FKA Twigs (formerly known as our favourite). We would have raved about Royal Blood too – and their awesome single Out Of The Black – as they are almost honorary Aussies (or half of them are anyway) having spent a year playing up and down here – but we didn’t get around to it quite and now feel bad. Listen to it HERE and consider yourselves raved to. We probably wouldn’t have raved about Say Lou Lou even though they are actually half Australian but that’s just the way taste tumbles isn’t it.

But even then we thought to ourselves what if the list was more about us here? What if we took half of their stuff out and put ours in. Or even switched ours in and made an all new Top 10? Shit! We’ve got enough talent in this neck of the woods to stretch it to 20! So get your eyes all over this list of 2o Aussie acts to watch and get your ears around our handy Soundcloud playlist that follows.

For several years now we have been told that we are inferior at cricket and that hasn’t come out well for them. And for even longer its been assumed that we are worse at music than we are at cricket. But now we ask – nay demand – ISN’T OUR LIST A BIT BETTER? HONESTLY? Isn’t it a bit more varied and a lot more delightful? We can conceive of a world where not everything is down tempo NuR&BTripCloudHop and artists are allowed to be innovative and varied. Alright we live in the same world where one radio station dominates but thank goodness they are free from [that UK major record company] commercial pressures and resolutely proud on their ability to help dig out talent. But even if it is NuR&BTripCloudHop we reckon we do that pretty well too. Our bedrooms are as full of producers as anyone’s. I guess we know we are right because more and more of those people from that UK major record company, Radio 1, Tastemaking blogs with taste are scouting our socials and trying to “groom” our artists into leaving these shores. But they come back .. and so we cant really complain too bitterly. Expect to see a bunch of them at ARIAs 2014 for Wax Volcanic’s mum to lampoon.

*in their own mind