Sacred Paws win the 2017 SAY Award

Strike a Match by Sacred Paws has won this year's Scottish Album of the Year Award

The debut album from the highlife-inflected Glasgow-London indie duo is the sixth winner of Scottish music's most prestigious award, joining past winners Bill Wells & Aidan Moffat, RM Hubbert, Young Fathers, Kathryn Joseph and 2016's winner, Anna Meredith. 

Strike a Match was produced by the band along with Tony Doogan (Mogwai / Belle & Sebastian / Teenage Fanclub) at Castle Doom, Glasgow and mastered at Abbey Road Studios. It’s a vibrant collection of songs which effortlessly combines infectious indie-pop and post-punk with African highlife guitars.

In our review of the album on its release in January, we said: "Sacred Paws' DIY ethos has little truck with identikit indie shapes, instead taking its cue from classic Afro-pop: the burbling beats, the clean guitar tone, voices raised in sweet and uplifting harmony, and the deft picking of the high strings a refreshing alternative to the, huh, regular alternative."

Sacred Paws receive a cash prize of £20,000 and each of the other shortlisted artists received £1,000. This year's SAY Award judging panel includes writer and broadcaster Stuart Cosgrove, Roland Gulliver of Edinburgh International Book Festival, Caroline Winn of the biennial Glasgow International art festival, author Amy Liptrot, and The Skinny's music editor Tallah Brash.

Read the full 2017 shortlist, and rewatch the award ceremony featuring live performances from The Spook School and Be Charlotte, below. 

The SAY Award 2017 shortlist:

C Duncan – The Midnight Sun
Ela Orleans – Circles of Upper and Lower Hell
Honeyblood – Babes Never Die
Konx-Om-Pax – Caramel
Meursault – I Will Kill Again
Mogwai – Atomic
Pictish Trail – Future Echoes
Rachel Newton – Here’s My Heart Come Take It
RM Hubbert – Telling the Trees
Sacred Paws – Strike a Match