Two good articles from the BBC which might be useful for finding the up & coming bands of 2009, and a couple you might have missed from last year:-

BBC NEWS | Entertainment | BBC Sound of 2009: The longlist
BBC NEWS | Entertainment | You should love this music because...

I can whole heartedly recommend Florence & The Machine (two EPs available on e-music) and Mumford & Sons (two EPs available at :- Streaming Music, Downloads and Independent Artists from RAWRIP.com - Music Served Raw (beware, expensive and low bit rate).

Just downloading Friendly Fires by Friendly Fires as I have heard they are good from a couple of people now. Hope they live up to the hype