The 2011 Shadow Polaris goes to the Russian Futurists

NxEW's readers almost always have profound disagreements with the Polaris jury. Of the 40 albums on our Shadow Polaris long list, 19 were not on the official Polaris list, and only 1 of the 10 Polaris short list albums made the Shadow Polaris list as well. Surprisingly that was Timber Timbre - "Creep On Creepin' On" and not the Arcade Fire. This year though our readers shocked me as well. The Russian Futurists - "The Weight's on the Wheels" climbed through 4 rounds of voting to take NxEW.ca's 2011 Shadow Polaris Award.

The album, which got good reviews from Exclaim, PopMatters, The Line of Best Fit and Herohill among others, did not seem to make the Polaris Music Prize radar, and honestly wasn't on mine either. That though is the beauty of trusting our readers and having an open process.

Of course this is NxEW, not Polaris, we have no sponsors, we have no advertisers and so we have no large cash prizes, no gala event, no national media coverage. Only some bragging rights in that, when left up to the portion of the public that visits this site "The Weight's on the Wheels" is the best album of 2011. It joins last year's winner the Wooden Sky's "If I Don't Come Home You'll Know I'm Gone" and 2009's "I Can Wonder What You Did With Your Day" by Julie Doiron on what is becoming an impressive list of picks by our readers.

You can find more from the Russian Futurists at RussianFuturists.com or on Twitter @RFMattHart.