Mercury brings heat to Portico Quartet campaign.

They may be rank outsiders at 33-1 but South London's Portico Quartet have been flung into the spotlight following their nomination for the Nationwide Mercury Prize, the winner of which is announced tomorrow (Tuesday).

Prior to nomination, the band's debut album Knee-Deep In The North Sea had slowly been building acclaim, with early supporters ranging from Gilles Peterson to Radio Four, while Time Out declared the set their jazz, folk and world music album of the year for 2007.

In the week following the announcement of the album's Mercury nomination, sales of Knee-Deep In The North Sea increased seven-fold. Media interest has also dramatically increased, with widespread broadsheet coverage and airplay but, most significantly, the nomination has led a number of publishing companies and labels to come knocking at their door.

Music Week talks to Nick Mulvey, whose decision to purchase a hang - a percussive musical instrument not unlike a UFO-shaped steel drum - at Womad shaped the sound of the band's debut album.

You have been called `Uber-cool jazz buskers' - how would you describe your sound?

It is instrumental music that draws from a lot of jazz and contemporary classical music that we all listen to but it has a real popular sensibility to it. We are writing songs that are very melody-driven and have a real groove to them. The music is open and quite accessible, yet it pushes a lot of margins. You play the hang. Was your discovery of the instrument at Womad key to the development of the band's sound?

Pretty key; both in the sonorous ...