LIST-O-MANIA

Monday night's Shortlist Music Prize event at L.A.'s Knitting Factory promises to be jammed with artists, writers and other creative types—oh yeah, and a fair number of industry weasels—eager to check out this year's honorees for "Artistic Achievement in Music."

And you thought awards shows were just about unit sales and skin-baring dresses.

Designed to address what its organizers call "the increasing disconnect between the cutting-edge and the mainstream," the Shortlist solicits music-makers, producers, programmers and writers to nominate "the 10 most creative and accomplished albums of the year." Five of this year's finalists—Virgin's Nikka Costa, Interscope's Bilal, PIAS U.S.' Sigur Ros, Capitol's Dandy Warhols and Rawkus' Talib Kweli—are slated to perform brief sets at Monday night's event. Several special guest appearances are also anticipated. The performances will be filmed for later broadcast on MTV2.

The winner will be announced toward the evening's end, at which time you'll probably be completely toasted. Shame on you.

The other five finalists are Ryan Adams (whose current album appears on Lost Highway but who's nominated for his Bloodshot release Heartbreaker), Astralwerks' Air, Virgin's Gorillaz, IDJ's PJ Harvey and K7 Studio/BBE's Jay Dee.

The "listmakers" include artists Beck, Macy Gray, Mos Def, Dave Grohl, Trent Reznor, Aimee Mann, ?uestlove (of The Roots) and Lucinda Williams; producers Dan the Automator, Steve Lillywhite and Ross Robinson; KCRW PD Nic Harcourt; and journalists Steve Hochman, Raymond Roker and Toure. MCA A&R whiz Tom Sarig ([email protected]) is among the organizers, and if he says it'll be cool, that's good enough for us.

Sponsor Virgin Megastores will award $10,000 to the Prize winner, along with another $10k to a Sept. 11-related charity of the winner's choosing.

Need more info? Holla at PMK geniuses Gina Hoffman (310-289-6200) and Jodi Lederman (212-582-1111).