FIGHT LIKE APES have been installed as early favourites to win the 2010 Choice Music Prize for Irish Album of the Year, after contest organisers released the final shortlist for the award this afternoon.

The Dublin fourpiece are among the nominees for their album ‘The Body of Christ and the Legs of Tina Turner’, as is Imelda May for her sophomore effort ‘Mayhem’, and one-man band Villagers for ‘Becoming a Jackal’.

The shortlist was selected by a panel of Irish music media professionals from across the media spectrum, chaired by Tony Clayton-Lea and including the likes of 2fm’s Dave Fanning, Today FM’s Ray D’Arcy, Shane Hegarty of the Irish Times and Phil Udell of State.ie.

The winning act, to be announced at a live event at Dublin’s Vicar Street on March 3 and broadcast live on Today FM, will receive a €10,000 prize fund. Tickets for the show, priced at €22 including booking fee, are available through Ticketmaster.

Paddy Power has already opened a market on the award, with Fight Like Apes priced at 4/1, ahead of Halves, O Emperor and Adebisi Skank, all of which are priced at 5/1.

Cathy Davey and Villagers – who were nominated for the UK-based Mercury Music Prize for their album ‘Becoming a Jackal’ – are priced at 6/1.

The full shortlist of nominees is as follows:

• Adebesi Shank - This is the Second Album of a band called Adebisi Shank (Richter Collective)
• The Cast of Cheers - Chariot
• Cathy Davey - The Nameless (Hammer Toe Records)
• Fight Like Apes - The Body of Christ & The Legs of Tina Turner (Model Citizen)
• Halves - It Goes, It Goes (Forever & Ever) (Hate is The Enemy)
• Imelda May – Mayhem (Universal)
• James Vincent McMorrow – Early in The Morning (Universal)
• O Emperor - Hither Thither (Universal)
• Two Door Cinema Club - Tourist History (Kitsune)
• Villagers - Becoming a Jackal (Domino)

Previous winners of the award include Julie Feeney, who won the inaugural gong in 2005, the Divine Comedy and Jape.