Well, the favourites rarely win, and things seemed to be tipping in Antony Hegarty's favour as last night's prize giving approached. Nevertheless, the victory of Antony And The Johnsons and the album 'I Am A Bird Now' at the 2005 Mercury Music Prize surely surprised many, if only because, until they were shortlisted, most people thought of Antony And The Johnsons as an American band.
Certainly Chichester-born but New York based Hegarty seemed surprised at his victory, telling the prize giving audience: "I think they must have made a mistake. I am completely overwhelmed. I think that's insane". Aside from the £20,000 that comes with winning the Prize, both Hegarty and his UK label Rough Trade should benefit from a post-Mercury sales boost, which has to be good thing.
And while some of the CMU team favoured MIA and the Go Team out of the shortlist the Mercury judges compiled, Hegarty is definitely a worthy winner, if only for his post-victory description of the slightly bizarre cross-genre music award: "It's kind of like a crazy contest between an orange and a spaceship and a potted plant and a spoon - which one do you like better? What's really exciting about this night is just this wonderful biennial that shows the rich diversity of the spectrum of music that's going on at the moment. It's been so wonderful to be here and just to meet everyone. I just love so many of the artists performing tonight, I think it's a bit bonkers to just give it to one person."
Commenting on the decision to give the prize to Antony And The Johnsons, Simon Frith, chairman of the Mercury Music Prize judging panel, told reporters: "It's not like any album I've heard before or since. It doesn't seem to have any obvious place where it's coming from - and yet play it to anybody and they're arrested. Some of them hate it, some of them absolutely love it - but nobody can ignore it."