Many great albums win huge music awards and many of the worst, thoughtless, most vile attempts at music making some times win those exact same awards. But psychologically, something changes about an album when it triumphs over other albums in a man-made contest. It starts to perceive itself in an enough different ways that, eventually, we too begin to see the very same record that we loved more than we loved our husband/hated more than we hated...sure, let's stick with husband here, like it's a whole new entity. As divisive as Arcade Fire's Polaris Music Prize win was among some of you guys, I can't see one thing that has changed about my relationship with this record. I was smitten with its music and conceptual lyrics before Monday evening, just as I was before it won every major honour a rock record can win on this planet. But what about you? How is Wednesday's The Suburbs compared to the one that existed at around 11:00 PM on Monday?
Has the Polaris Music Prize ever impacted your perception or appreciation of an album? How do you relate to The Suburbs now that Arcade Fire have won Polaris? Old or new, Canadian or otherwise, what is your album of the week?