Justin Bieber stiffed for Polaris Prize

The Polaris Prize committee's version of the Top 40 was unveiled today and boy, are Justin Bieber fans gonna be pissed! Of course, neither of the Bieb's two releases involved the use of glockenspiel nor were they issued by Montreal's Secret City label so he never had a hope of making the Long List of Canadian albums (issued between June 1, 2009 and May 31, 2010) being considered for the $20,000 prize in the fifth annual running of the indie rock popularity contest.
The aim for the Polaris Prize may be to reward outstanding artistic achievement by rising Canadian talent whose sales figures and lack of industry connections would otherwise exclude them from Juno consideration by the Canadian Academy of Recording Arts, but in reality, it all comes down to the sadly skewed opinions of a few music critics, bloggers, broadcasters and sundry insiders who don't have a good handle on anything which hasn't been hyped by Pitchfork and/or Exclaim. So perhaps if Bieber were to hire Owen Pallett for some string sweeting and maybe bring in Dan Snaith aka Caribou for some electronic tweakery, he may have a shot next year.
In the meantime, it's now up to the Polaris Jury to select the 10 albums from those listed below (in alphabetical order) that will make the Polaris Music Prize Short List, slated to be announced on July 6 at the Drake Hotel. For more information about the Polaris Prize visit their site polarismusicprize.ca

2010 Polaris Music Prize Long List

Apollo Ghosts - Mount Benson (Vancouver)

Bahamas - Pink Strat (Toronto)

The Besnard Lakes - The Besnard Lakes Are The Roaring Night (Montréal)

Blue Rodeo - The Things We Left Behind (Toronto)

Brasstronaut - Mt. Chimaera (Vancouver)

Broken Social Scene - Forgiveness Rock Record (Toronto)

Basia Bulat - Heart Of My Own (London)

By Divine Right - Mutant Message (Toronto)

Caribou – Swim (Dundas)

Jason Collett - Rat A Tat Tat (Toronto)

Crystal Castles - Crystal Castles (II) (Toronto)

Amelia Curran - Hunter Hunter (St. John’s)

Fred Fortin - Plastrer La Lune (Montréal)

Frog Eyes - Paul's Tomb: A Triumph (Victoria)

Hannah Georgas - This Is Good (Vancouver)

Ghostkeeper - Ghostkeeper (Calgary)

Holy Fuck - Latin (Toronto)

Karkwa - Les Chemins De Verre (Montréal)

LeE HARVeY OsMOND - A Quiet Evil (Hamilton)

Greg MacPherson - Mr. Invitation (Winnipeg)

Dan Mangan - Nice, Nice, Very Nice (Vancouver)

Misteur Valaire - Golden Bombay (Montréal)

The New Pornographers - Together (Vancouver)

Owen Pallett - Heartland (Toronto)

Plants And Animals - La La Land (Montréal)

Radio Radio - Belmundo Regal (Montréal)

Justin Rutledge - The Early Widows (Toronto)

The Sadies - Darker Circles (Toronto)

Shad - TSOL (London)

Elizabeth Shepherd - Heavy Falls The Night (Toronto)

The Slew - 100% (Montréal)

Meaghan Smith - The Cricket's Orchestra (Halifax)

South Rakkas Crew - The Stimulus Package (Toronto)

Tegan And Sara - Sainthood (Vancouver)

The Wooden Sky - If I Don't Come Home You'll Know I'm Gone (Toronto)

Hawksley Workman - Meat (Huntsville)

You Say Party! We Say Die! - XXXX (Vancouver)

Young Galaxy - Invisible Republic (Montréal)

Yukon Blonde - Yukon Blonde (Vancouver)

Zeus - Say Us (Toronto)