Show must go on for Mobos

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It's A big year for the Music of Black Origin Awards, celebrating its 11th birthday at the Royal Albert Hall tomorrow night, and for the first time, deemed big enough by the BBC for a live broadcast.

Performances by Corinne Bailey Rae, Jamelia, Lemar and Sway will be the main event, as far as television is concerned, but for the Mobos' organisers, 2006 is the year that they take their place alongside the Brits and the Mercury as a must-see on the music calendar.

It's an extraordinary achievement by founder Kanya King, who has driven the Mobos forward despite gripes and protests, sometimes from the black British music scene that she has sought to promote.

Her biggest controversy was in 2004, when the Mobos' committee withdrew nominations of two reggae artists after protests from the gay activist group OutRage at homophobic lyrics. Reggae supporters complained that the Mobos had given in too easily. But, for King, the show had to go on.

Her aim has been to attract overdue attention to the influence of black music in Britain. The Mobos have brought to popular attention UK performers who might have been ignored by the mainstream. It's not putting it too strongly to say that the future of black British music depends on the annual spotlight of these awards.

The creation, for the first time this year, of Brit-only categories, for best UK male and best UK female (presented in association with the Evening Standard), surely reflects the growing stature of black British music beside its long-established American cousin.

By the same principle, the vague "music of black origin" tag that allows nominations of white artists along with black, though heavily criticised in the early days, allows for a kind of reflecting glory on the event and all of its nominees.

In the second year of the awards, winners included Jamiroquai, Mick Hucknall and the multi-racial Prodigy. Critics carped that, if the Mobos were so keen to highlight such established white acts, and as almost all the popular music we listen to has its origins in black music, why not just give the gongs to U2 and Madonna?

But they missed the point. The success of the Mobos lies in their playing the crossover card. The reasoning was that fans and media who might ignore - for whatever reason - a line-up of only black artists would be drawn in by a smattering of white mainstream stars.

None of us like to think that white Britons are put off by black culture. But the Mobos' acknowledgment of our tendency to see another race's culture as "not for us" was key to gaining mainstream acceptance for black British music.

Now, when an unknown black British artist wins an award - which they do, regularly - it's seen as a reward for talent, rather than a protest vote against a white-dominated music business. Would north London rapper Sway have been nominated for this year's Mercury Music Prize unless he'd won best hip hop act at the Mobos?

Anything's possible, but by giving a homegrown newcomer a major award over one of the big American rappers he was pitted against, the Mobos lent Sway an overnight credibility that would've taken him years to build.

There is room for improvement. The five reggae nominations this year - Sean Paul, Shaggy, crooner Anthony Hamilton, Bob Marley's son Damian Marley and veteran rasta vocalist Burning Spear - show that the Mobos have all but turned their back on dancehall, which, whatever one may think about some of the artists' lyrics, remains the single most popular genre of music among young black Britons.

Surely there are plenty of dancehall artists who deserve nomination but don't advocate violence against gays? Or does "the newly organised Mobo academy which now includes 500 members of the public" have problems deciphering the heavy patois of dancehall MCs?

Quietly dropping dancehall outside of the relatively cuddly Sean Paul may have seen off Peter Tatchell, but it is just one of the many genres that remain ignored by the Mobos. British-made, producer-led dance music is notable by its absence, and new underground genres such as dubstep, breaks, grime, and the fledgling fusion that is "grindie" (grime-meets-indie rock ) are conspicuously missing.

It's tempting to conclude that the Mobos, with their corporate sponsors, four nominations for Beyoncé Knowles, and dress-to-impress audience policy, have no time for what could be termed "alternative" black music.

Until you notice the inclusion of awards for Best African Act and Best Gospel, two genres that have been popular among black Britons since the first waves of immigration, yet have been largely ignored by everyone else.

There is no other mainstream music awards ceremony that brings up so many vital talking points - what black music is and who listens to it, about black attitudes to sexuality and white attitudes to race relations, about America's power over Britain, about music's mainstream and underground and how they might co-exist and influence each other. The Mobos matter because they have a habit of exposing what matters to us. That's quite an achievement for a somewhat unruly 11-year-old.

• The Mobo Awards take place tomorrow at the Albert Hall. Tickets still available from www.mobo.com, £25. BBC3 shows the ceremony live at 9pm.

 

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