The annual Polaris Music Prize honors the Canadian Album Of The Year (released between June 1 and May 31) as chosen by a jury of music journalists, broadcasters, and bloggers. Unlike, say, the Grammys, which is always embarrassingly out-of-touch and maybe even objectively wrong, the Polaris Prize frequently goes to a winner that is both deserving and kind of unexpected. Last year, for instance, it went to Godspeed (who called out the award ceremony for being “tone deaf”). Today, the long list for 2014 Polaris Music Prize nominees went up, and it includes some legit awesome albums, including Gorguts’ Colored Sands, Tim Hecker’s Virgins, Moonface’s Julia With Blue Jeans On, Owen Pallett’s In Conflict … Hell the most obvious frontrunner is Arcade Fire’s Reflektor and even that would be a pretty cool pick. I’m pulling for Gorguts though! Here’s the long list in full:

Arcade Fire – Reflektor
AroarA – In The Pines
Austra – Olympia
Philippe B – Ornithologie, la nuit
BADBADNOTGOOD – III
Basia Bulat – Tall Tall Shadow
Chromeo – White Women
Cousins – The Halls Of Wickwire
Cowboy Junkies / Various Artists – The Kennedy Suite
The Darcys – Warring
Dead Obies – Montréal $ud
Mac DeMarco – Salad Days
DIANA – Perpetual Surrender
Drake – Nothing Was The Same
Freedom Writers – NOW
Fresh Snow – I
Frog Eyes – Carey’s Cold Spring
Gorguts – Colored Sands
Tim Hecker – Virgins
Jimmy Hunt – Maladie d’amour
Jessy Lanza – Pull My Hair Back
Kalle Mattson – Someday, The Moon Will Be Gold
Moonface – Julia With Blue Jeans On
Mounties – Thrash Rock Legacy
Odonis Odonis – Hard Boiled Soft Boiled
Owen Pallett – In Conflict
Pink Mountaintops – Get Back
PUP – PUP
The Sadies – Internal Sounds
Shad – Flying Colours
Shooting Guns – Brotherhood Of The Ram
Solids – Blame Confusion
Rae Spoon – My Prairie Home
The Strumbellas – We Still Move On Dance Floors
Tanya Tagaq – Animism
Thus Owls – Turning Rocks
Timber Timbre – Hot Dreams
Chad VanGaalen – Shrink Dust
Bry Webb – Free Will
YAMANTAKA // SONIC TITAN – UZU