Diesel:U:Music celebrates its best year ever at the 2007 Diesel:U:Music Awards, honouring the crème of the crop of international unsigned talent as well as presenting awards to Contribution To Music Award winner Peter Saville and the 4Music Icon Award to the legendary Joy Division. This year is the second year that Diesel:U:Music will be presenting the Public Vote Award, judged by members of the public via the Diesel:U:Music website.
This year’s unsigned winners have been judged by an expert panel of musicians and producers, with the rock/indie category being judged by Motley Crue legend Nikki Sixx, producer extraordinaire Butch Walker and the illustrious Peter Hook. The electronic category was judged by past winner Mylo, DJ Felix Da Housecat and producer Jagz Kooner. East London grime MC Wiley, renowned producer Howie B, songwriter Devon Harris and RnB queen Kelis have all judged the urban/hip hop category. With such expert ears having judged this year, the calibre of the international winners is guaranteed to be high.
And the winners are…
Isle of Wight born and now London based electro duo Get Shakes wowed the judges with their blend of punk funk and jacking electro, winning the electronic category hands down. Get Shakes are made up of brothers Matt and Darren Farrow, having played their first ever live date in Summer 2006 the boys have gone on to play London superclub Fabric and shows all over the UK. Combining their chunky synths with live percussion, it’s an eye-catching live show that blows most of today’s other live electro acts out of the water.
Storming the urban category are the USA’s hottest export Cool Kids, the hip hop duo making waves in the American underground having quickly gained a huge cult following. Referencing 80’s hip hop and yet sounding fresher than ever Cool Kids are in their own words, “Two Regular guys from the city of wind who happen to make pretty dope shit” and this year they are going to be huge.
Finally, the winners of the rock category are American band The Features. Having already amassed 14000 friends on MySpace and received rave reviews from the music press after releasing their single ‘Leave It All Behind’, The Features are setting out on a quest for world domination. Having been described as an American version of the Kaiser Chiefs, The Features are clearly also very popular with music fans as at this year’s Diesel:U:Music Awards they have done something quite special and won both the Rock and Public Vote Awards.
Peter Saville, one of the founding members of Factory Records and the artist behind all of the Factory Records’ sleeves including Joy Division’s seminal album Unknown Pleasures and New Order’s Blue Monday, will receive the Diesel:U:Music Contribution to Music Award. A major player in the graphic design revolution, Peter Saville’s record sleeve designs changed the way people thought about pop music. Saville has also designed covers for PULP, Roxy Music, Wham and OMD. Peter Saville is now creative director for the city of Manchester.
Pioneering post-punk band Joy Division will be awarded 4Music Icon Award at the Diesel:U:Music Awards. This Award recognises Joy Division as one of the most influential and inventive bands in British music history. Having released debut album Unknown Pleasures and completing second album Closer before the tragic suicide of lead singer Ian Curtis in May1980, Closer has been described “as magnificent a memorial as any post-Presley popular musician could ever have” by the NME. Diesel:U:Music is proud to celebrate the works of such a great band.
The Diesel:U:Music Awards took place on 3rd October, 2007 at Koko, Camden, the champagne was flowing courtesy of Tattinger and the awards were hosted by Alexa Chung, Alex Zane and Nick Grimshaw. The Diesel:U:Music Awards will be shown on Channel 4 on Sunday 21st October at midnight with excerpts from the show being shown on Freshly Squeezed with Alexa Chung all week from Monday 15th October, 2007.
