CMAT - EURO-COUNTRY

It's almost inconceivable that it's only five years since the arrival of CMAT, as she approaches the release of her third album. This BRITs/Mercury/Ivors-nominated acronymic star feels like she's been part of the culture forever - and what has endeared fans to her heart-sore tunes and humour is CMAT's ability to combine contradictory themes and moods: wide-eye drama with self-deprecation. Country music has always been a lynchpin for CMAT, but this is country in an augmented, reimagined way. Mixed with classic indie and affirmative soul-pop, it resists the music industry's desire to pigeonhole artists as one genre.