MERCURY RISING

If we’re honest, we have to say that this comes as no surprise. But the annual Mercury Prize luminaries from right across the music business have just published their shortlist of potential winners and, frankly, it’s festooned with MPG Full Members. In fact, no fewer than nine out of the twelve albums on the list were either produced, mixed, engineered or mastered by our Full Members, and we’re as proud as parents on Sports Day.

What this means is that the majority of producers and engineers right at the top of their game recognize the benefits of being part of the Music Producers Guild, and who knows, we may have helped them in some small way to achieve this recognition. In any case we thought you’d like to get a sneak preview of who they are, so – cue trumpets and påté de foi gras – here’s our ace eight:

alt-j ‘Relaxer’

Producer: Charlie Andrew
Charlie was BRITS-sponsored MPG UK Producer Of The Year in 2016
Engineer: Brett Cox, who won the MPG Breakthrough Engineer Of The Year Award in 2016

Blossoms ‘Blossoms’

Producer: Rich Turvey
Mixer: David Wrench
David took MPG Mix Engineer Of The Year in 2016
Mastered by Matt Colton, who won MPG Mastering Engineer Of The Year in 2013

Ed Sheehan ‘÷’

Mixer: Mark ‘Spike’ Stent
Spike is a veteran at this: MPG Mix Engineer Of The Year in 2011, 2014 and 2015

Glass Animals ‘How To Be A Human Being’

Mixers: David Wrench & Matt Wiggins

Kate Tempest ‘Let Them Eat Chaos’

Mastered by Christian Wright

Stormzy ‘Gang Signs And Prayer’

Executive Producer: Fraser T Smith
Engineer: Manon Grandjean
Earlier this year Manon picked up MPG Breakthrough Engineer Of The Year

The Big Moon ‘Love In The Fourth Dimension’

Producer: Catherine Marks
Catherine was MPG Breakthrough Producer Of The Year in 2016 – and a Mercury nomination is exactly what we mean by ‘breaking through’

The xx ‘I See You’

Producer: Rodaidh Mcdonald
Mixer: David Wrench
There he is again: Mix Engineer Of The Year in 2016, as if you didn’t know

Sampha ‘Process’

Producer: Rodaidh Mcdonald
Mixer: David Wrench
(Who is this guy…?)
Mastered by Matt Colton

In fact, if you’re a Full Member and were involved with any of these projects, tell us and we’ll get you onto the list. It’s not only worth celebrating, but it also helps us to accrue the credit data needed to support our Credit Where Credit Is Due campaign to get our work acknowledged in downloads and databases.

We’d just like to say well done to everyone on the list. If we’ve left anyone out, we’re sorry – it’s not as easy as it looks – but like we said, let us know. We’re all ears…