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Kaytranada’s 99.9% won the 2016 Polaris Music Prize among a highly contested field, joining past winners such as Caribou, Arcade Fire, Feist, and Godspeed You! Black Emperor. The music award selects the best full-length Canadian album based on artistic merit and awards winner $50,000, while each of the other nine Short List nominees each receive $3,000.
99.9% is the Haitian-born, Montreal-based producer’s debut album, featuring high profile appearances from the likes Anderson Paak, Vic Mensa, AlunaGeorge and fellow Canadian River Tiber, making his win pretty spectacular.
Earning the prize with a debut album isn’t exactly something that happens every day, even if Kaytranada — born Louis Kevin Celestin — was already well-known for his producing work, most notoriously for the remix of Janet Jackson’s “If” that jumpstarted his career. Winning the Polaris will surely boost his profile even higher and catapult him to the upper echelon of the industry.
Of course, the 23-year-old is still reeling:
wow this shit is crazy
— KAYTRA (@KAYTRANADA) September 20, 2016
This year’s strong short list featured Carly Rae Jepsen’s E•MO•TION, which just celebrated its one-year anniversary, as well as other standouts including White Lung’s Paradise, Grimes’ Art Angels, Jessy Lanza’s Oh No, and PUP’s The Dream Is Over. Check out the full Short list below:
Black Mountain, IV
Basia Bulat, Good Advice
Grimes, Art Angels
Carly Rae Jepsen, E•MO•TION
Jessy Lanza, Oh No
PUP, The Dream Is Over
Andy Shauf, The Party
U.S. Girls, Half Free
White Lung, Paradise
Here’s the entire ceremony if you’re so inclined:
Or you can stream Kaytranada’s debut below if you haven’t heard it yet.