The category announcements keep coming as the Choice reveals its third category of the week recognising Irish musicians.
On Monday, the Irish album of the year prize nominations were announced, along with Irish Artists of the Year yesterday.
Today it is the turn of five Irish Breakthrough artists, and two of them were nominated yesterday also.
The 5 Irish Breakthrough Artist nominees are:
- Biig Piig
- Sprints
- Kneecap
- Jordan Adetunji
- Kingfishr
As I said yesterday for both the acts also nominated:
Kneecap’s 2024 was obviously a massive one – a critically acclaimed film / loose biopic that is tipped for an Oscar, a debut album on Heavenly and huge shows in Dublin, Belfast and beyond, performing on Fallon on US TV, protesting the US military at SXSW, with no signs of stopping.
Jordan Adetunji meanwhile, blew up with his song ‘Kehlani’ which went on to get a version of the song featuring the singer and has the Belfast rapper and artist poised for mainstream success.
Sprints’ 2024 was a big one as the band released their debut album on City Slang last January and built their following with their live reputation and once-off singles as they went, ending up as one the buzziest Irish bands of the year. Their album was nominated for the main prize too.
Biig Piig’s reputation and audience has been growing for a number of years now with 2025 likely to be her actual breakthrough year with the release of her debut album 11:11 this February. Less a breakthrough, more a wider acceptance of the artist’s strong releases and live performances over the last six or seven years.
And, as for Kingfishr – anyone who has read this site in the last 20 (!) years knows their folky pop thing is way too generic for me to be enthused about but they’ve certainly captured a big audience in a short time and are in with a shout for this (I think it’s decided by RTÉ this one).
The rest of the week brings new shortlist announcements this week:
Classic Irish Album – further details Thurs 9th January
(winner announced ahead of the live event)
Irish Song of the Year 2024 – shortlist Fri 10th January
(winner announced 6th March on 2FM daytime)
The public vote for SOTY will open on Friday 10th January.
