The Scottish New Music Awards have been and gone, and they appear to have been as awesome as the voting form suggested: when I tried to place a vote for an artist I know, the form wouldn’t let me continue unless I voted in every other category – which means I was expected to vote for the best Scottish music teacher, the best Scottish sound engineer, and various other best-things which I didn’t have a clue about.

Needless to say, I didn’t bother lest I be the man responsible for making Scotland’s second-best music teacher think he or she was the first best. Imagine the consequences.

Anyway… The Pop Cop describes a thrilling line-up:

In the Artist of the Year category, two of the five nominees were 57-year-old Dougie MacLean and fellow veteran Dave Arcari, a relative spring chicken at 47. There was also Sandi Thom who, should you need reminding, hoodwinked the public into giving her 15 minutes of fame before said public escorted her to the exit.

I know Mr Arcari, and he’s a nice bloke. Talented, too. But he, like Maclean and Thom, hardly qualifies as “new music” – unless by “new music” you mean “new music from people who’ve been on the scene for ages”.

Mind you, it sounds like it was a star-studded affair.

The 2011 Scottish New Music Awards… will feature many new and unsigned acts as well as a guest list of celebrities from the global music industry. Some of the guests already confirmed include Nazareth, members of The Sensational Alex Harvey Band, cast members from Still Game, former X-Factor winner Leon Jackson and many personalities from Radio and Television. Guaranteed to be a star studded event.

I realise Scotland isn’t exactly awash with famous people but for an event that the organisers had the brass neck to claim was “similar” to The Grammys and The Brits, is that really the best they could cobble together?

If you’ve even a passing interest in the Scottish music scene, you’ll love the Pop Cop’s full post. I’ll leave you with my favourite bit:

In an evening of amateurishness, the biscuit was well and truly taken by the room’s faceless voiceover man who, with genuine panic, announced just after 8pm that the ceremony was running precisely one hour and 20 minutes ahead of schedule… “if any bands feel like getting up and playing, we’ve got hours and hours of radio time and award time to fill”