It may be a month until the nominees for the Mercury Prize are released, but Paddy Power have already opened betting on what will be named the ‘Album of the Year’ this time around  – and it’s Alt-J who look the favourites. 

‘An Awesome Wave’ currently has odds of 6/4, making it the resounding front-runner, with closest competitors Richard Hawley, Sweet Billy, Django Django and Florence & The Machine standing at 10/1. Hot Chip, The Maccabees and Emeli Sande are the next closest at 14/1, with Bombay Bicycle Club, Ed Sheeran, Orbital and Blur guitarist Graham Coxon making up some of the other outsiders.

It should be noted that a victory for Leeds/Cambridge art-rockers Alt-J, who received a perfect 5-star rating for their debut album here at FMV, is far from in the bag due to the award’s reputation for controversy.

Previous winners of the award include PJ Harvey (twice), Arctic Monkeys, Elbow, The xx, Franz Ferdinand and Dizzee Rascal, to name just a few. The nominees for the 2012 Mercury Prize will be revealed on September 12th, with the ceremony taking place on the 1st of November.