And the Song of the Year 2012 is…

Hey guys! Happy 2013 everyone!

I hope everyone had a good time seeing the year out… It can’t have been worse than a regular Monday night, right? It feels like 2012 has flown by literally. So, voting for the Song of the Year thing has closed and it’s time for me to announce the results and write up some conclusions, even…

In last year’s write up I wrote about the awesome things the guys did that year, like podcasts, radio show, The Optimist Anniversary Tour and other creative little projects. And I spoke of hoping that they keep doing that.

They didn’t.

What they did do, was sit on there LAZY asses and not do anything. NO NEW ALBUM, NO NEW SINGLE, NO NOTHING!!!!!

Well that’s not completely true. Of course, we’ve got an Olly solo album, If Not Now When, and if you were lucky enough you might have caught the guys playing a show somewhere in the UK (or that one gig in Italy). And Gale popped up in some strange places, like that Gaobi project that is available on iTunes, and most recently on stage somewhere in London. Unfortunately, these things don’t show up via Google Alerts beforehand, so I couldn’t tip you guys about it, but if you were there, let us know what it was like. 🙂

I guess I shouldn’t complain too hard… I was very excited when If Not Now When came out and it definitely ranks amongst my favourite records to date. But as much love as there is involved with a home project, now I’ve started longing for new band material, new tours and new awesomeness.

Well there’s hope, because those recording sessions have begun… After jamming around at the TB studios in November, the band have been tweeting hints about recording since early December and as recent as 20 December:

Hard day slogging it at TB studios, refining and blueprinting, hope the world doesn’t end before we get this stuff out…

Well the world didn’t end and there appears to have been contact with the label as well, with Olly tweeting:

Funny how many tweeps seem to be digging on Outbursts album lately, label says its been selling steadily for nearly 3 years now, grower!

And I think rightfully so… I can’t believe it’s already three years since we saw the first teaser for Outbursts. A lot has happened since then. Many covers and little projects, but Outbursts still feels fresh. If I’m going to have to predict anything (which I shouldn’t because I don’t know any more than you), I’d say we MIGHT get a new album in the Autumn. If we’re lucky. I’m hoping sooner, but Autumn feels like a likely scenario. And yes, that seems AGES away. 🙁 Please prove me wrong guys…

In THIS interview while in Italy in November the guys hit the nail on the head, trying to find something familiar and new with each album. Olly says for the new album they’ll try to “re-engage with what we think is our true identity”… So far that sounds like THIS (Sleeper, recorded live in Italy on a phone). It’s hard to comment on the song until we hear it in a less distorted manner, but it’s a good teaser and it sounds like they might up the volume for this record, which is a good thing I’d say… They’ve also mentioned they want to try to capture the “live feel” on record, so that might result in heavy involvement of Rob and Ed and songs recorded live in studio, perhaps…

But whatever 2013 might bring, let’s hope it’s awesome. 2013 is also the year that Ether Song celebrates its 10th birthday and Ether Site as well… No celebratory events planned as such, but we’ll keep you posted. I don’t think we can expect an anniversary tour like The Optimist (new music all the way, hey!), but we could do something nice on Ether Site eh? Somewhere between March (Ether Song release) and May (Ether Site launch). If you’ve got any ideas, get in touch!

Results

Have I stalled for  long enough? Good! Onto the results then… For the first time there were some additional questions like favourite cover song and how many times you saw TB… But the heart of this contest is the Song of the Year 2012… And for the first time in its history it’s the same song as last year! Yes! The one! The only! The legendary:

UNDERDOG (SAVE ME) IS SONG OF THE YEAR 2012!

Only one other song has won the competition twice (Long Distance in 2005 and 2007), so it’s a massive achievement for Underdog (Save Me) to do so!

Of the 88 songs people could vote for, 51 actually received votes. I wanted to make a top 50, but I felt sad for The Seagull so… If your favourite song isn’t in here, then clearly you haven’t voted… Better vote next time then! In brackets you can see last year’s position… Most remarkable achievers this year are Radio Silence, getting quite a lot of votes, and Average Man, nearly making the top 5, coming for a mid-twenties position last year… Also, Painkiller didn’t get a lot of love this year… Why guys? Anyway, here’s the list of songs:

1. (1) Underdog (Save Me) (2011 winner)
2. (4) Fishing For A Dream (2008 winner)
3. (6) Feeling Oblivion
4. (3) The Sea Change (2010 winner)
5. (8) Long Distance (2005, 2007 winner)
6. (27) Average Man
7. (14) The Door
8. (9) State Of Things (2006 winner)
9. (30) Radio Silence
10. (16) Ether Song
11. (15) Last Clown
12. (2) Mind Over Money (2009 winner)
13. (3) Dark On Fire
14. (25) Rain City
15. (40) Apocolips
16. (43) Never Stops
17. (12) Stone Thrown
18. (23) Bye Pod
19. (13) Emergency 72
20. (31) Slack
21. (5) Painkiller
22. (18) Red Moon
23. (37) Building Wraps Round Me
24. (–) Here Comes The Moon
25. (22) Last Chance
26. (38) Over and Over
27. (34) Paper Heart
28. (36) Rescue Squad
29. (17) Rocket Song
30. (26) The Optimist
31. (19) Come and Go
32. (–) Embryos
33. (50) Loopa
34. (24) New Star
35. (–) The Letting Down
36. (32) Asleep With The Fireflies
37. (47) Full Of Stars
38. (11) Mirror
39. (–) So Long
40. (35) They Can’t Buy The Sunshine
41. (21) Future Boy
42. (–) Ghost
43. (–) Jackinabox
44. (49) Jet Trail
45. (58) Timewaster
46. (39) Underdog (Sally)
47. (–) 5 Mile (These Are The Days)
48. (42) Clear Blue Air
49. (33) Outbursts
50. (–) Real Life
51. (57) The Seagull

So make of that what you will, eh :).

Here are the other results!

Favourite albums (based on answers to the question)

1. The Optimist LP
2. Ether Song
3. Outbursts
4. JackInABox / Dark On Fire
5. Bottled At Source

Album popularity (based on points collected by the individual songs)

1. The Optimist LP (29,71%)
2. Ether Song (20,17%)
3. Outbursts (19,51%)
4. JackInABox (16,63%)
5. Dark On Fire (9,53%)
6. B-sides / non-album songs (3,10%)
7. Bottled At Source (1,33%)

* = Bottled At Source category only includes songs that FIRST appeared on this album, which explains its low ranking.

Favourite Cover Songs

1. Wicked Game / Chim Chim Cher-ee
2. Black
3. Rikki, don’t lose that number
4. Nessun Dorma
5. Here Comes My Baby
6. Breaking The Girl
7. Ascension Day
8. 74-75
9. Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere

* = this is a top 10, but number one and two were equally popular, hence the tie at the top of the table…

How often have you seen Turin Brakes live?

1. 1-5 times (48%)
2. 6-10 times (19%)
3. 10+ times (10%)
4. A scary amount of times (10%)
5. Never 🙁 (13%)

* = on behalf of the 13% of voters that haven’t seen TB live yet… Please return to The States and Downunder guys ;)…

Favourite TB line-up (live)

1. Olly, Gale, Rob, Ed and Phil (29%) / Olly, Gale, Rob and Ed (29%)
2. I don’t care (ANYTHING!) (24%)
3. Just Olly and Gale (18%)

* = Once again, the 4-piece and 5-piece live line-up prove equally popular. Some people don’t care and just wish the band would come to their town already. Though there’s some interest for a duo tour as well… 

Next time I see Turin Brakes live, they really should play…-setlist (ordered by most named songs)

1. The Sea Change / Ether Song
2. So Long
3. Rain City
4. ANYTHING!!!!!!
5. Apocolips
6. Stalker
7. The Letting Down
8. Radio Silence
9. Over and Over
10. Loopa
11. Last Clown
12. Embryos

* = this would actually make for pretty good setlist, and the boys could even throw in one of their own favourites and play a double encore ;).

Olly Knights Solo Top 5

1. If Not Now When
2. Bitten By The Frost
3. Searching For England
4. I Hope I Know You Well
5. These Days of Sun

And with that, I leave you guys. Thanks for voting everyone. The winner of the bootleg cd (Joey) has been contacted and will hopefully receive his disc not long after the plane that’s transporting it has landed. I’ll be providing you guys with news as soon as I can, but if you’ve got stuff to share or want to help out, do get in touch! It’s a fansite after all… 🙂

Now let’s hope by this time next year we’ve got at least an album’s worth of songs added to the Song of the Year results :).