Godspeed You! Black Emperor wins Polaris Prize, hits Montreal strip club
Montreal-based post-post-postpunk art collective Godspeed You! Black Emperor has won the 2013 edition of the Polaris Prize, beating out Tegan and Sara and a bunch of bands from Toronto.
The famously media-shy group, which was nominated for 'Allelujah! Don't Bend! Ascend!', did not attend the ceremony. Instead Ian Ilavsky of the band's Constellation Records label accepted the prize.
In collecting the $30,000 cheque for this year's Polaris, Ilavsky announced that the group would use the money to fund music programs in Quebec prisons, that presumably meant to be some sort of art statement that only the ghost of Marlon Brando will get.
Sorry, that part about the strip club was just to get your attention.
Godspeed You! Black Emperor is actually celebrating its victory somewhere in an unheated apartment with a meal of cold lentils and stale tap water.
Comments
3 Comments
@DRobishow
Sep 23, 2013 at 9:18pm
Damn, ya got me.
Christine
Sep 24, 2013 at 11:13am
BTW,Zaki Ibrahim was born in Vancouver and grew up in Nanaimo
Ad
Sep 24, 2013 at 4:30pm
Kind of a cynical response from you, no?
Its interesting to watch the music media try to now repudiate the makers of the best album of the year after feeling slighted by the band's response.
I don't care enough to really figure out if they are right or wrong in their decision to accept vs reject, donate to one cause rather than another, or to issue a combative statement following the award - but its certainly interesting to see your reaction. Kind of looks like a kid pissed off at their own birthday because something didn't go as planned.