tim harriet: stephin merritt, because he's impervious to the fickle tastes of the spin generation.

douglas dark beloved cloud: stuart murdoch, just because he came along at a moment that looked like it was kinda post-song and made it clear that, well, no, it's just not.

ld flare: stephin merritt...cause I'm the daddy and I say so.

tim dagger: stuart murdoch, because he writes the most beautiful songs I've heard in a long, long time.

christopher future bible heroes: stephin merritt. listen to his albums and it just makes sense, doesn't it?

ian musical chairs: stuart murdoch because he made indiepop feel relevant and alive again.

peter marine research: stephin merritt, calvin johnson‹because no one else could have done what they've done (obviously I am discounting any song-writers I am in bands with!)

richard davies: richard davies because is it just damn foolishness or bravado that made him do it.

rick brown: james mcnew.

sean high llamas: my current songwriting obsession must be with a brazilian, and that particular brazilian must be marcos valle circa 1967­1973. why? well, the tunes were amazing the chords unpredictable and the sounds or sonics unpredictable. there was a pop understanding alongside a pioneering spirit. the brazilians from that period said it all and the U.K/USA didn't even know.

corin sleater-kinney: kurt cobain was the most influential songwriter‹everything changed after nirvana. music changed, radio changed, not necessarily for the better...

liz clayton: stephin merritt? bill callahan? I don't know.

andrew beaujon: that's assuming songwriters can be important, an idea to which I don't subscribe. if I did, I'd say the guys who wrote "macarena," because almost every person on earth knows it.

jon high llamas: can't answer that. malkmus is probably my favourite.

sasha ui: babyface. full global absorption.

eszter balint: probably k. cobain because 1. he's got the mythical story 2. he's the only one who proved you can be pretty, sad, funny, smart, and still be immensely popular all at the same time. (though beck came close).

tim keegan: elliott smith is probably my favorite. his songs are beautiful and resonant and not at all sickly.

janet quasi/sleater-kinney: sam coomes is my favorite songwriter of the 90s, and I'm lucky enough to be his drummer. wit, insight, and a mastery of melody and rhythm, combined with his unique outlook, propel his songs into the stratosphere of good.

lloyd cole: probably malkmus. crooked rain is probably my favorite american records of the past 10 years. there's enough good songs on that to add up to more than all the good beck songs put together.

nick "momus" currie: beck. it's all in the mix.

mike dropbeat/slumberland: that's a tough one. probably kurt cobain, if only because the success of nevermind made guitar-based rock/pop commercially viable again. can you even imagine the continued success of labels like sub pop and matador and all the indies they support without "teen spirit"?

tim hopkins: neil hannon. because he embodies all that is most vile and smug in pop music. because he more than anyone has helped to keep my hatred sharp.

gail cf: with all due respect to stevie, stuart, stephin, and james, I have to say graeme downes.

harvey williams: I saw ron sexsmith perform live the other night, and he is now officially my most important songwriter of the past decade. honestly, I was in tears throughout the whole show, it was that moving. can't really say why he's important, but all the songs on his first 2 lps are under 3 minutes long. reason enough, I think. I guess jarvis c. is probably more important, but I don't think it's important to be important, y'know what I mean? you can certainly quote me on that.

lois: pj harvey.

louis philippe: a dead-heat between two quintessential englishmen: andy partridge of XTC, who keeps getting better‹by which I mean more honest, more lyrical, less quirky for the sake of it, while retaining all of his originality; and martin newell, a true poet, the only lyricist of genius that england has produced since ray davies. a reason why? listen to the greatest living englishman and to the off-white album. very rare, precious stuff.

mateo siesta: true creators in the past decade? most are copycats or irrelevant. creativity springs from the 60s and early 70s: roger nichols, bergen white, paul williams, bacharach, john barry, dedrick, barry mann, jim webb, jobim & moraes, fox & gimbel. in any case I admire the creative sparks of: bid, bernard summer, jim ruiz, david gedge or malcolm eden to name a few.

john electroscope: I would go for stuart staples of tindersticks who brought a dark tinge of melancholia into the mainstream.

sam quasi: elliott smith.

dan saturday people: the problem I have with this question stems from the word important. I mean, what am I supposed to say: tim gane or sean o'hagan because of their ability to synthesize rather than pastiche their influences? or something cheeky like bob dylan or richard james? I don't think important applies to a form which has not been making linear progress since the '70s.

gerard cosloy: I really hate the word important. my favorites are chris cacavas, bill callahan, barbara manning and the guy from the brainbombs. as baron von rasche would say, "that is all the people need to know."

f.m. east river pipe: I don't know about "most important," but for me the "best" would be pet shop boys. I listen to their album very... "dreaming of the queen," "the theatre," "to speak is a sin," "young offender." un-frickin'-believable!

candice pedersen: I'm not sure that there were any fantastic songwriters in the '90s. everything seems so fleeting. when I think "important" I think that the songwriter's songs must transcend the period that they were written. I'm not sure that people are making records that you will want to listen to 10 years from now. using that as my criteria I'd have to say that johnny cash is my pick for most important songwriter of the 90s. his two albums on american records are still in heavy rotation at my house.

john the magnetic fields: ron sexsmith is my current favorite.

alan licht: most important: kurt cobain, for setting up a new formula for radio hits... "favorite" is pj harvey -- maybe...

rob marine research: myself and cathy (marine research) for our composition "krazy steaks" (see answer to stuck-lyric Q).

graeme verlaines: still have to be cobain, quite simply for marrying raw emotion with a towering compositional logic.

gavin o'hara: a tie. elvis costello because, with the juliet letters (w/brodsky quartet) and painted from memory (w/burt bacharach), he's shown you can still be a punk-rocker even while wearing a tuxedo. björk because she's the only one out there with a blueprint on how beautiful it can be to simultaneously embrace tradition and hurtle oneself into the future.

paul beer frame: chris knox. to get an idea of how good he is, just listen to his recent outtakes album, almost‹even his leftovers sound like instant classics. and lyrically, he tackles serious subjects without sounding like a blowhard, silly subjects without sounding like novelty, and confessional subjects without sounding like james taylor.

franklin bruno: songwriters aren't important. but: graeme downes (verlaines), for sheer harmonic complexity plus stupid, retrograde things like emotional impact and catchiness.

amelia marine research: calvin johnson (favourite, not most important).

jeff kickstand: daniel johnston. outsider art is the last frontier. lyrically and melodically daniel boldly goes where no man has gone before. daniel leaves the brill building tenants behind and makes his rent check out every month directly to his soul.

robert dennis: I really can't narrow it down to just one. but I wish it was me.

evelyn hurley: mark robinson, just because.

katrina jeepster: ummm, seeing as he managed to get me (however indirectly) such a great job, it would have to be stuart murdoch. beautiful mesmerising witty lyrics and he's a nice person too.

mac superchunk: these folks have all had their moments when I thought "my favorite of the decade": hubley-kaplan, mark eitzel, stephin merritt, elliott smith, kurt wagner. I think if it was the last decade we were discussing I would not have hesitated to say "forster-mclennan" though tom waits, martin phillipps and "morrissey-marr" would not have been far behind.

emmanuel les inrockuptibles: the songwriting team in mercury rev, because they're not afraid by melodies that might sound dated. they use their love of music and musical history in a very modern way, twisting classicism into something very new and beautiful.

jim o'rourke: hmm... tough to decide who is "important" I'd have to say I'm most impressed in the growth of bill callahan as a writer, lyrically. that's a tough one. I adore roy harper, despite the production on his more recent records, the songs are still great.

stuart mogwai: richard d. james. because his songs could not have been made 20 years ago and will still be listened to in 2020.

greg castaway stones: mark robinson, makes music fun, makes music good.

chity moving pictures: for me, it is most important the feeling of the singer than the words of the song. I always listen to the voices like other instruments of the band, so it's the emotion of the singer what shake my heart, words fly. for example, the celeste's singer (I don't know his name) and the jumprope singer (cindy?).

patrick yoyo: my favorite, mary water of little red car wreck, because I got to be in a band with her!

delia/scarlet day of the family way and ms c.c. rider of action time: bit recent for me. lee hazlewood's still alive. will he do? I like nick cave's interpretation of classic songs and stories into more violent modern versions...

julie butterfield: tucker, weiss, brownstein.

mike caught in flux: stephin merritt, stuart murdoch, barbara manning, stephen malkmus, john darnielle, beck, stereolab. their best songs will stand the test of time. CF