Arcade Fire, the late Gord Downie of The Tragically Hip and Sloan are the most well-known names on the 40-album long list knocked out of the running for the 2018 Polaris Music Prize, recognizing Canada's album of the year as determined by a jury of music media. Announced this morning, the 10 short-listed albums up for the coveted prize are: Alvvays' Antisocialites; Jean-Michel Blais' Dans ma main; Daniel Caesar's Freudian; Jeremy Dutcher's Wolastoqiyik Lintuwakonawa; Pierre Kwenders' MAKANDA at the End of Space, the Beginning of Time; Hubert Lenoir's Darlène, Partner's In Search Of Lost Time; Snotty Nose Rez Kids's The Average Savage; U.S. Girls' In A Poem Unlimited; and Weaves' Wide Open.

Alvvays, U.S. Girls and Weaves have all previously landed on the Polaris Music Prize short list. The rest are first-time nominees. Grammy-nominated R&B singer Caesar, who has been selling out tours internationally and collecting awards (inc. Junos, SOCAN, MMF, CRMA), is the best known globally. Jean-Michel Blais and Hubert Lenoir are both Quebec-based francophone artists; Dutcher made an album of songs in his near-extinct Indigenous language Wolastoq; Indigenous hip hop duo Snotty Nose Rez Kids focus on identity and injustice; garage-rock duo Partner call themselves "genre defying," "part teenage diary" and "100% queer;" and Montreal-Kinshasa artist Pierre Kwenders defines his music as "Congolese Trap." READ MORE Arcade Fire, Gord Downie & Daniel Caesar Make Polaris Music Prize Long List For the 2018 short list, 191 jury members -- comprised of music journalists, broadcasters and music bloggers from across Canada and representing all genres – selected their top 5 picks out of the 40 long list titles. The votes are made online via Polaris' password-accessed site.

The long list was determined from 225 jury-suggested titles from which each juror's top 5 was submitted on the first ballot. Of note, the 2018 Polaris Music Prize has 203 jury members (up two from 2017 and up from 192 in 2016) but only 191 of those people actually voted. As the rules demand, the albums are judged solely on artistic merit, without consideration of genre, record sales or professional affiliation. The eligibility period for the titles is from June 1, 2017 to May 31, 2018.