New Musical Express names NME Awards nominees

PanARMENIAN.Net - Arctic Monkeys, Noel Gallagher, Lana Del Rey, The Vaccines and Odd Future are among the acts nominated for gongs at this year's New Musical Express Awards.

The nominations were announced exclusively on Zane Lowe's BBC Radio 1 show with the winners to be announced at the ceremony at O2 Academy Brixton on February 29.

Arctic Monkeys – who've scored seven nominations in total – will go head-to-head with Kasabian, Bombay Bicycle Club, The Horrors and Muse for the Best British Band award. The Best New Band category, meanwhile, will be contested by Lana Del Rey, Tribes, The Vaccines, Wu Lyf and Foster The People.

Kasabian, Florence And The Machine, Muse are up for three gongs each, while The Horrors, Hurts and The Vaccines are among the acts nominated for two awards.

Noel Gallagher – who's due to pick up the prestigious Godlike Genius Award on the night – is up for another four gongs, including Best Album for 'Noel Gallagher's High Flying Birds' and Best Solo Artist.

Meanwhile, Odd Future will take on the likes of Foo Fighters and The Strokes for Best International Band, while Azealia Banks' '212' is up for Dancefloor Anthem alongside tracks by Katy B and Justice, NME.COM reported.

The New Musical Express (better known as the NME) is a popular music publication in the United Kingdom, published weekly since March 1952. It started as a music newspaper, and gradually moved toward a magazine format during the 1980s, changing from newsprint in 1998. It was the first British paper to include a singles chart, in the 14 November 1952 edition. In the 1970s it became the best-selling British music newspaper. During the period 1972 to 1976 it was particularly associated with gonzo journalism, then became closely associated with punk rock through the writing of Tony Parsons and Julie Burchill.

An online version of NME, NME.COM, was launched in 1996. Today NME.COM has 5 million users per month.