What can we glean from the 2015 Scottish Album of the Year (SAY) Award longlist, which is announced today?

Well, we can surmise that the Scottish music landscape is gorgeous, kaleidoscopic and thriving. That the hills are alive with the sound of rock 'n' roll and jazz and pop; of electronica, punk and folk. That Kathryn Joseph's exquisite debut could provide the SAY Award with its first female winner. That Young Fathers might be crowned twice in a row. And that Mogwai are just showing off.

Since the SAY Award was launched by the Scottish Music Industry Association in 2012, it's offered a platform to celebrate home-grown talent, reminded us of the value of the album as an art form, and reaped myriad financial rewards for our local artists (the winner receives twenty thousand pounds, with a further nine shortlisted runners-up each pocketing a grand). Its victors to date have been exceptional, and diverse: jazz-pop librettists Bill Wells and Aidan Moffat picked up 2012's garland for Everything's Getting Older, 2013 saw flamenco-punk heartbreaker RM Hubbert bag the accolade for13 Lost & Found, and last year's laurel was awarded to Tape Two, from hip-hop dissidents Young Fathers, who went on to scoop the Mercury Prize.

As with previous years, the 2015 longlist is dominated by independent labels (Fat Cat, Rock Action, Chemikal Underground, Soma, Night School and Hits The Fan among them), and pits notable debuts against up-and-coming artists and enduring sonic trailblazers. 2015's 20-strong longlist, detailed below, was elected by 100 industry nominators. It will be reduced to a shortlist of 10 albums on May 28 - nine of which will be decided by a panel of judges, and one of which will be called by public vote - before the overall winner is announced on June 17. And it bears noting that a position on this years longlist has been harder-won: the SMIA has extended the eligibility period to

15 months, for one year only, which allows future qualifying periods to run from April to March, thus aligning it more closely with the ceremony in June (it was previously dictated by calendar year).

As usual, the long-list celebrates a clutch of remarkable Scottish debuts, not least Kathryn Joseph's jaw-dropping LP, Bones You Have Thrown Me And Blood I've Spilled (Hits The Fan), which sees the Aberdeen singer-songwriter variously invoke Karen Dalton, Joanna Newsom and vintage gramophone vibes across a raw and intimate album of startling, stark piano ballads. Edinburgh-Glasgow duo Honeyblood's raucous, eponymous debut (Fat Cat) is similarly thrilling, and sees the grrrl-pop queen bees reign over swaggering Americana, indie chorales, searing grunge pop and garage-punk lullabies, while Glasgow disco-chanson duo Happy Meals conjure Gallic techno and cosmic post-punk on their intoxicating calling card, Apero (Night School Recordings). There are also longlisted debuts from alt-rock harmonists Fatherson with I Am An Island (A Modern Way) and deranged rock 'n'

roll trio The Amazing Snakeheads, whose Amphetamine Ballads (Domino) now reads as a riotous punk lament: the band have split up already.

If the Snakeheads' career is the shortest-lived on 2015's long-list, then it's offset by a handful of tenacious acts whose pop CVs stretch back two decades (or more), and who continue to release outstanding music. Mogwai's death-disco opus, Rave Tapes (Rock Action) gives rise to the band's third SAY nod (after Hardcore Will Never Die, But You Will and Les Revenants), making them the most nominated act to date: a feat that is testament to their genius, as much as their prolific output. Rave Tapes crashed the UK Top 10 upon its release last year, making it the band's most commercially successful album so far, and King Creosote's sublime paean to our collective memories, From Scotland With Love (Domino) - which soundtracks the Virginia Heath film of the same name - bagged Fife bard KC, aka Kenny Anderson, a similar first: the album skirted the UK Top 20. This is Anderson's second SAY nomination, after 2012's shortlist for his collaboration with Jon Hopkins, Diamond Mine. Elsewhere, there are welcome longlist nods to enduring alt-rockers Idlewild - with the blustering punk-folk poetics of Everything Ever Written (Empty Words) - and Belle and Sebastian, who bounce back with the bookish, glitterball indie-pop of Girls In Peacetime Want To Dance (Matador).

Such established artists testify to Scotland's resilient independent music scene, and their influence can be discerned across a slew of nominations for the contemporary sonic guard, who've emerged in the last ten years or so. The Twilight Sad's staggeringly great fourth LP, Nobody Wants To Be Here And Nobody Wants To Leave (Fat Cat) is as claustrophobic, intoxicating and compelling as its title suggests - it's a truly brooding, beautiful album - and it marks a welcome return to the SAY long-list for the Kilsyth alt-rockers, who preciously bagged 2013's public vote for No One Can Ever Know. Last year's SAY Winners Young Fathers return with the almighty DEAD (Big Dada) - which won the Mercury Prize; they picked up 2014's SAY Award for Tape Two - and Scottische pop sorcerers The Phantom Band body-pop onto the long-list with their kraut-folk masterpiece Strange Friend (Chemikal Underground). Grunge-pop tearaways PAWS make their second SAY longlist appearance with the delirious Youth Culture Forever (Fat Cat), after their debut, Cokefloat, was nominated in 2013. And let us give thanks for Withered Hand, the gorgeous Edinburgh thrash-folk bard whose long-awaited second album New Gods (Fortuna Pop!) was one of last year's most heartening, and enlightening. Post-electro warlocks Errors make a return appearance, too, with the euphoric astral disco of Lease of Life (Rock Action) picking up where its 2013-nominated precursor, Have Some Faith In Magic, left off.

Scotland's clubbing subculture is deservedly saluted thanks to the inclusion of Slam's Reverse Proceed (Soma) on this year's longlist, and while there's a dearth of jazz and classical titles, folk makes waves in its myriad guises, thanks to composer and multi-instrumentalist Mike Vass' In The Wake of Neil Gunn (Unroofed), Treacherous Orchestra's roof-raising Grind (Reveal), and Blue Rose Code's Americana-fired The Ballads of Peckham Rye (Ronachan Songs).

And if it's a swaggering pop star you're seeking, then look no further than Paolo Nutini, thanks to Caustic Love (Atlantic).

If this article is notably male dominated, as have been previous SAY Award lists (despite a concertedly equal gender balance in the nominators and judging panel, it must be said), then it's heartening to note that all three of this year's female-led acts - Kathryn Joseph, Honeyblood, Happy Meals - are nominated for brilliant debuts.

Here's hoping they inspire others; that more women feature with each passing year. Listen close as you put the needle on these longlisted

records: the revolution might start here.

The 10-strong SAY Award shortlist is announced at Glasgow CCA on May 28; this year's SAY Award winner is announced at Glasgow 02ABC on June 17. www.sayaward.com