BBC Radio 2 is asking listeners to cast their vote in their Ultimate British Group poll for National Album Day.
Open from Monday 16th September until 4pm on Friday 27th September, listeners can vote for their five favourites to find Radio 2’s Ultimate British Group to mark the annual all-day celebration of the album format. A British group is any band of 2+ members that is made-up wholly or the majority are people who were born, live or hold British citizenship.
A star-studded panel, including Radio 2 presenters, have voted from a long list of nearly 100 bands to produce a final list of 54, which spans the 60s, 70s, 80s, 90s, 00s and 10s. The list has been compiled from the timeless melodic music that is played on Radio 2 and the Most Successful British Groups on the Official Albums Chart.
The Top 30 most popular will be revealed in a countdown show with Mark Goodier on Saturday 19th October at 1-3pm, to coincide with National Album Day 2024. The programme will be available on BBC Sounds from Friday 11th October as part of a National Album Day Collection, alongside a selection of other programmes as part of the celebration.
An additional show, Your Ultimate British Group: The Extras, will be available in the BBC Sounds collection, which will feature (in no particular order) the bands which are voted in position numbers 31-50 in the chart. Both shows are BBC Audio productions. Plus, all music played on Radio 2 on National Album Day will be from Great British groups, from Sounds of the 60s with Tony Blackburn (6-8am) through to Sounds of the 90s with Fearne Cotton (10pm-midnight).
The chairman of the panel who have selected their favourite groups to create the list of 54 to vote on is Radio 2 and 6 Music’s Head of Music, Jeff Smith, who is also the chairman of the Mercury Prize judging panel. Also on the panel, were Radio 2 presenters Jo Whiley, Sara Cox, OJ Borg, Vernon Kay, Scott Mills, Trevor Nelson, DJ Spoony, and Owain Wyn Evans.
Jeff Smith, Head of Music for Radio 2 said: “The UK has produced so many globally loved bands over the past seven decades, so I’m looking forward to finding out who our listeners will vote their favourite group.”
Jo Whiley said: “Such a tough decision to choose my favourite British groups of all time! Looking down the list, it was literally the soundtrack to my life – from the first music I ever heard on my mum and dad’s stereo, to being a teenager and saving my pocket money to buy my own records, and then so many groups I’ve had the pleasure of meeting and interviewing on my own radio shows, some of them from when they were unknowns to now being on this list of the best British bands!”
The full list of groups to vote for are:
- 10cc
- All Saints
- Arctic Monkeys
- Bananarama
- The Beatles
- The Beautiful South
- Bee Gees
- Blur
- The Clash
- Coldplay
- Culture Club
- The Cure
- Depeche Mode
- Duran Duran
- Elbow
- Electric Light Orchestra
- Erasure
- Eurythmics
- Fleetwood Mac
- Florence + the Machine
- Frankie Goes To Hollywood
- Genesis
- Girls Aloud
- The Human League
- Imagination
- The Jam
- The Kinks
- Led Zeppelin
- M People
- Madness
- Manic Street Preachers
- Muse
- New Order
- Oasis
- One Direction
- Pet Shop Boys
- Pink Floyd
- The Police
- Pulp
- Queen
- Radiohead
- The Rolling Stones
- Simply Red
- The Smiths
- Soul II Soul
- Spice Girls
- Stereophonics
- The Stone Roses
- Sugababes
- Take That
- UB40
- Wham!
- The Who
- Wings
