FEATURE:
Temperature Check…
IN THIS PHOTO: Holly Humberstone released her new album, Cruel World, on 10th April, and it is one that I feel is worthy of a Mercury Prize nomination/PHOTO CREDIT: Silken Weinberg via NME
Some Early Mercury Prize Shortlist Predictions
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I do this around this time of year…
IN THIS PHOTO: Lauren Laverne (BBC Radio 6 Music and BBC Radio 4) presented last year’s Mercury Prize in Newcastle/PHOTO CREDIT: Jonty Davies for Good Housekeeping
as the Mercury Prize takes place on 22nd October. The ceremony returns for a second consecutive year to the Utilita Arena in Newcastle. The award celebrates the best albums from British and Irish artists. We have many contenders to come before the ceremony but, in terms of eligibility, albums must be released by British or Irish artists between roughly mid-July 2025 and mid-July 2026. I am going to talk about some of those that I feel will be included. As there are three months between me publishing this feature and mid-July, I will revise this after that date. However, there have been some strong releases that I feel will be among the shortlisted. Not only was the Mercury Prize held in Newcastle and outside of London for the first time. It was also won by an artist outside of London: Sam Fender for his album, People Watching. The artist who hails from North Shields was a worthy winner. A dozen albums are shortlisted every year. There have been winners from outside of London, those most of the wins in the past decade have been from artists based in London or born there. Will 2026’s prize go to an artist outside the capital? You can follow the latest developments from this year’s awards on the Mercury Prize Instagram page. I am publishing this on 11th April, so I am aware that some contenders might slip through before I share this. However, I will share a review of each album that I feel is up for Mercury shortlisting this year. Let’s start with Lola Young’s I'm Only F**king Myself. Released on 19th September, it was one of the best albums of last year. This is what DIY wrote:
“Far from a reinvention though, Lola’s sound has never stuck anywhere near the formulaic. Her debut album’s opener and notably a pre-release single, ‘Stream Of Consciousness’ fittingly threw structure right out the window. That her third full-length opens then with the guitar-led ode to pre-rehab hedonism ‘FUCK EVERYONE’ proves a further statement of intent, in-keeping with ‘Messy’’s middle-finger to the socially acceptable and a riotous introduction to her most vibrant sound yet. For every ‘One Thing’ - the still-excellent multi-million streamed lead single - there’s a ‘SPIDERS’, one of the year’s most affecting rock ballads with driving distortion gliding into Lola’s obvious pain. In it, she deals with the notion of womanhood, identity and relationships; another staple that has emerged from one of the UK’s most exciting songwriters, presenting emotion and vulnerability with a raw swagger that have underpinned the careers of Amy Winehouse and Adele. In style, of course, she welcomely sits separate.
‘I’m Only Fucking Myself’ is an exploration of anger, written in the wake of huge success and addiction. Much here deals with external relationships and a recognition of personal worth, such as the gliding sunshine pop of ‘Walk All Over You’, paired with more personal introspection, including the momentary return to soul on ‘why do I feel better when I hurt you?’ or the emotional downfall on the acoustic ‘who fucking cares?’. Combined it paints a picture of a leading songwriter with even more to come, one that can piece together exceptional art from personal turbulence and insecurity, effortlessly reaffirming her position at the top of UK pop… if we can even call it that”.
One album that is pretty much guaranteed shortlisting is The Art of Loving Olivia Dean. Released on 26th September, this award-winning and hugely acclaimed album might scoop another honour at this year’s Mercury Prize. It has won more than its fair share of impassioned reviews. Her 2023 debut, Messy, was shortlisted. Ezra Collective won for Where I'm Meant to Be:
“While you wouldn’t describe it as a complete reinvention, it certainly constitutes a noticeable rethink. It expunges most of the cliches of Dean’s debut album – or rather quarantines them on a track called Close Up – and instead looks for inspiration to music that emanated from recording studios in 70s LA. The Art of Loving dabbles in both Rumours-adjacent soft rock – you’re never far from a sun-dappled electric piano line or a breezy acoustic guitar; Baby Steps offers up slick, yacht rock-y funk – and, on So Easy (To Fall in Love), Carpenters-style MOR pop that would once have been considered entirely beyond the pale.
It’s a sound that’s familiar without feeling hackneyed or self-consciously retro: Something Inbetween is powered by a muffled rhythm that sounds like someone playing a techstep drum’n’bass track with a duvet over the speakers; lurking in the depths of Nice to Each Other there’s a wash of shoegaze-y guitar noise and gusts of ambient synth drone. Airy and inviting, it suits Dean’s sweetly understated vocals – mercifully lacking affectation, either of the post-Winehouse “jazzy” variety or the weird, consonant-mangling “indie voice” that’s supposed to connote intimacy in 21st-century pop – and adds a cinematic gloss to her lyrics. Dean is big on diaristic detail as she navigates ex-related angst and tentative new relationships: “I don’t know where the switches are, or where you keep your cutlery.”
Perhaps more importantly, Dean and her co-authors – including Tobias Jesso Jr, and Matt Hales, who once plied his trade as singer-songwriter Aqualung – have significantly upped their game. Every chorus has been polished until it catches the light (Baby Steps offers a particularly gleaming example), while one suspects that an enormous amount of effort has been expended on making the melodies of Nice to Each Other and I’ve Seen It sound as effortlessly charming as they do.
So the album breezes past. It’s exceptionally well made but feels entirely natural; it’s mainstream commercial pop, but laudably devoid of obvious cliches. If Dean’s debut seemed like an artist trying to find their place in the landscape by ticking relevant boxes, The Art of Loving seems like someone finding their own voice. The sight of Olivia Dean battling a cartoon K-pop band in the charts’ upper echelons is proof that pop in 2025 is a business you can’t really predict, but still, The Art of Loving’s success seems a foregone conclusion”.
Another artist who was recently shortlisted for the Mercury Prize and will be again this year is Lily Allen for West End Girl. This is another hugely successful album from an artist who has produced her very best work. She is touring the album and I feel is an early frontrunner for Mercury inclusion. Released on 24th October, I want to spotlight one review for one of 2025’s best albums. Here is what Pitchfork noted about West End Girl:
“Despite unavoidable comparisons to Lemonade or 30, West End Girl is much leaner and more brutal. Unlike those records, Allen’s album is too concerned with honoring moment-to-moment feelings of hurt and betrayal to really reach for a mature overview of the breakup. But what the songwriting lacks in conceptual development, it makes up for in raw emotion and narrative thrust. Allen’s truth bears out in a blow-by-blow account of coming to grips with a partner’s infidelity and gathering the resolve to leave for good. “Never get your sympathy/I don’t think you’re able,” she sings on “Let You W/In,” “But I can walk out with my dignity/If I lay my truth on the table.” There are plenty of pop songs about love as a drug, but I don’t think I’d ever heard one about heartbreak as a threat to sobriety until “Relapse.” Going through the motions of an unwanted open relationship would be painful enough, but throwing motherhood into the mix on “Nonmonogamummy” and “Dallas Major” is simply excruciating.
The record is a relief map of broken boundaries and abandoned commitments and Allen colors it in hellacious, knife-twisting detail. On “Pussy Palace,” she reveals that Bluebeard’s dungeon is actually a West Village bachelor pad stocked with sex toys, butt plugs, and lube. The perfectly paced reveal of “Madeline” (“But you’re not a stranger, Madeline”) is stomach-churning in its implication, even as it veers into cringe comedy with an unsettling Allison Williams impersonation. One of the truest West End moments occurs in “Sleepwalking,” when Allen tries desperately to re-kindle the spark with one of the funniest inversions of Oliver! put to record: “I know you’ve made me your Madonna/I wanna be your whore/Baby, it would be my honor/Please, sir, can I have some morе?” Occasionally she strains to sell the horror. “4chan Stan” has an edgy title but a faulty premise: No one who spent extended time there has ever been worth losing sleep over. That song also suggests Allen went to the Whitney Houston school of amateur sleuthing: “Never been in Bergdorf’s/But you took someone shopping there in May ’24.”
The turntablism on “Dallas Major” feels canned and anonymous, and the sunny soft rock of “Tennis” is too nondescript to hold any tension, but for the most part the production on West End Girl acquits itself pretty well. The emotional freefall of “Ruminating” feels like a cleaned-up Farrah Abraham cut, dislodging an avalanche of conflicting thoughts over unstable dance music. The medicated lullaby of “Sleepwalking” is perfectly suited to the bad daydream of fresh heartbreak. That song and “Just Enough,” about being slowly poisoned by a lover’s refusal to share the whole truth, just barely contain her aching vulnerability. They represent an evolution of Lily Allen’s signature style, so that the lightness isn’t a foil for her irony, but a vehicle for her hurt.
Nearly a hundred years ago, the writer Ursula Parrott covered shockingly similar terrain in her 1929 novel, Ex-Wife. Parrott’s Patricia is left slowly, then suddenly by her husband, with an open relationship sealing the end of their marriage. “He grew tired of me; hunted about for reasons to justify his weariness; and found them,” Patricia wryly laments. After describing all the ways she’d bent over backwards to keep her partner in her life, Allen finally realizes that she’s been left screaming in an empty room. “Wish I could fix all your shit, but all your shit’s yours to fix,” she sings with biting clarity on “Fruityloop.” Having recovered herself from the wreckage, West End Girl is a testament to how remarkable Allen is on her own”.
I think that women will dominate the 2026 shortlist. Maybe eight out of the twelve albums. One group that I feel will be in the running is The Last Dinner Party for From the Pyre. Perhaps it has been out for long enough that it might be overlooked, though I feel From the Pyre was one of the best albums of last year. It was released on 17th October. There were a lot of positive reviews for the band’s second studio album. I want to include parts from what When the Horn Blows said:
“The band leaves no breathing room between track one and two as Count The Ways sets off with a stanky riff that will have listeners screwing their faces up in approval. The dark, angsty riff is the backdrop to the yearning lyrics that cry out in pain against the story of someone struggling to move on from an ex-lover. The Last Dinner Party has certainly taken an entirely darker turn with this album and it perfectly suits their romantic maximalist aesthetic; if Tess of the d’Urbervilles wrote a song, I’m sure this is what it would sound like.
As we move into the latter half, the project becomes filled with meditative pieces on womanhood. A Woman Is A Tree and I Hold Your Anger explore the divine relationship between nature and femininity, reflecting the female energy that courses through the veins of Mother Earth herself, as well as through every woman whilst also confronting the generational pain and love that flows down from women of the ages. Aurora Nishevci, the band’s pianist/keyboardist, leads the vocal for I Hold Your Anger bringing a welcome earthy counterpart to Morris’ ethereal rock voice.
Sail Away deals with similar ideologies but through the contemporary lens of a modern relationship. The outro of this track is a well built up crescendo which combines all the band’s voices into a hymn-like ascension which could bring a tear to any listener's eye.
The penultimate track uplifts the pace and thematically sums up the whole project with ideas of love, death and reincarnation:
Don't cry, lie here forever
Let life run its course
I'll be here in the next one
Next time, you know I'll call
Coming just at the right time before the audience is suitably mellow, The Scythe arrives to breathe a new balls-to-the-wall energy into your bones assuring you that life and all its ups and downs are a part of something bigger. The level of philosophy explored throughout The Last Dinner Party albums is enough to fill a library. Musically the song draws on more stringed instruments than the album as a whole which gives the song a strongly cinematic feeling.
Finally rounding off the album is the jaunty yet empowering, Inferno which feels like a strongly bittersweet closer. While upbeat and led by a perfectly jovial piano, the lyrics remain poetic and thoughtfully sincere and what better image could end an epic album more than a scorching blaze of fire.
From The Pyre, is a ruminative and exciting step up from Prelude To Ecstasy, and the achievement it represents cannot be understated. It feels more meaningful, and to every fan it’s clear to see the natural progression and growth The Last Dinner Party have made as a band, exploring their unique and inspiring aesthetic through sharper imagery and tighter yet bolder musical arrangements”.
Fifteen more albums to get to, so I shall try and keep it brief. One of our very best artists, Cat Burns’s How to Be Human was released on 31st October. There are a couple of omissions from this feature. Charli xcx’s “Wuthering Heights” soundtrack album might not be eligible. I am also not including Reckonwrong’s extraordinary How Long Has It Been? EUPHORIA. said this in their four-star review:
“Cat Burns’ sophomore album How To Be Human is chock full of life experiences that are so sharp it’d crack through even the thickest armor. Let’s just say that she promised to deliver on the emotional content, and she did.
Speaking on the inspiration behind the project, the British singer-songwriter said: “I left a very big piece of me on this project, going through grief and heartbreak at the same time really rewired my brain chemistry, and I noticed when people try and give uplifting messages about getting through the hard times they never really go into detail about how they got to the end of the tunnel or even what the tunnel looked like, so I REALLY wanted to do that with this album and document the trenches of processing your emotions.”
Prior to the album’s premiere on October 31, she released singles such as “Something About Her,” “All This Love,” and “Please Don’t Hate Me,” all of which I had listened to. So naturally, my hopes were high going into the album, and I was also of the mind that I’ve got a sort of grasp on her musical style.
She opens with “Come Home” – no preps, no instructions, just right smack in the middle of the battlefield and left to fend for yourself. The spoken intro more or less clued me in on what the song would be about, but it still was not enough to stop the waterworks. “It was a rainy, rainy day in Wales / And the hospital ward was blocking the sky / When you were layin’ there with such love in your eyes / Did you know it then? Or did you think you had more time?” she sings. The spoken intro and outro are from Burns’ grandfather, John Burns, who passed away last April. According to Burns, this song was written to reflect the world views her grandfather held in life.
The one song that massively tears away from this is “GIRLS!” Apart from broadcasting some x-rated thoughts, the song also doubles as a confidence-boosting feminist anthem. “That I get to talk about girls, talk about girls, talk about / I only wanna talk about girls, talk about girls, all about,” she sings in the synth-driven pop track. From there, we go to “There’s Just Something About Her,” a sort of sister track to “GIRLS!”
The closing and title track, “How To Be Human,” is a soulful track about the masks we often wear to fit into society. Some of us may find it relatable, some of us may not. In general, whether it’s an acoustic ballad, or supported by melodic piano chords or gossamer strings, the production is kept minimalistic because the lyrics are always meant to be the star attraction, and they are”.
I was going to include Robbie Williams’s BRITPOP, though I am not sure that it will be shortlisted. It is a great album, but I don’t think the judges will consider it. One that they will consider is James Blake’s Trying Times. Released on 13th March, it is one of the most recent albums in this feature. It is also one that has received so much critical acclaim. In their five-star review, DORK wrote this about Trying Times:
“Seven albums in, James Blake sounds newly unburdened. 'Trying Times' carries all the elements that have defined his music for more than a decade: spacious production, ghostly electronics and that unmistakable voice, capable of turning a single line into a moment of heft. This time, though, it feels lighter, painting a portrait of an artist standing firmly in his own space, steering the whole thing exactly where he wants it to go.
That feeling runs through the album's bones. After years navigating the machinery of major labels, Blake has returned to London and rebuilt his creative world on his own terms. 'Trying Times' reflects that shift immediately. The songs feel instinctive, unfolding with openness.
Across its thirteen tracks, Blake moves through a wide emotional spectrum without ever losing his centre. Songs like 'Death Of Love' and the wonderful 'I Had A Dream She Took My Hand' capture the strange emotional weather of the present moment, tracing feelings of overload while still reaching toward empathy and connection. His writing remains deeply introspective, now carrying a warmth that's both grounded and generous.
There's also a playful spark running through the record that gives it extra lift. Guitars wander into the mix, rhythms stretch and bounce, and Blake's arrangements leave space for small surprises to bloom. Even with the meticulous precision that has always defined his production, there's a looseness in how these songs move.
By the time 'Trying Times' draws to a close, that freedom proves irresistible. Blake sounds energised by the room he has carved out for himself, following ideas wherever they lead and completely at ease in his own creative universe”.
I may cut one album from this feature, as it is going to be quite overloaded. However, when we think about locks for Mercury inclusion, you obviously have to mention RAYE’s THIS MUSIC MAY CONTAIN HOPE. One of this year’ best albums, it was released on 27th March. A fair few five-star reviews for this modern classic. I want to include Rolling Stone UK and their review of an album that they highlight is “life-affirming”:
“This Music May Contain Hope is a concept album about overcoming self-doubt, heartbreak and hollow Romeos – the fourth track is titled ‘The WhatsApp Shakespeare’ – but one loose and sprawling enough to allow for musical detours. RAYE pulls off crackling funk on ‘Skin & Bones’, recruits Al Green for the silky soul ballad ‘Goodbye Henry’, and reminds us with ‘Life Boat’ that she can still write a club banger when she wants to. Her latest single, ‘Click Clack Symphony’, features beats that mimic the thwack of high heels on a hardwood floor and crashing instrumentation from Oscar-winning composer Hans Zimmer. It’s a girls’ night out bop in the same way that a croquembouche is just a pastry.
And like a croquembouche, this album gives you a lot to digest. There are extended spoken word sections, tracks that switch tempo midway through, and ear-snagging flourishes like the brief snippet of chipmunk vocals on ‘Winter Woman’. Throughout, RAYE displays a great ear for detail – “His lips were thin and beer-stained and tear-stained,” she sings on ‘Nightingale Lane’ – and a deft turn-of-phrase. “I can’t shake this, I can’t fake this, I should just pay to rearrange this,” she sings on ‘I Hate the Way I Look Today’. It’s a reference to facial filler, perhaps, on a song that definitely isn’t musical filler.
There are bits destined to be skipped, not least the four minutes of contributor credits that RAYE recites at the end, name by name, but her warmth and generosity paper over moments that could feel de trop. The euphoric disco of ‘Joy’, which features RAYE’s younger sisters Amma and Absolutely, is every bit as infectious as her recent chart-topper ‘Where Is My Husband!’
Besides, given how creatively constrained RAYE felt during her major label days, when she was encouraged to stay in her lane as a mainstream dance-pop artist making bops for All Bar One and Love Island, it feels mean-spirited to quibble with the odd moment of over-indulgence. This Music May Contain Hope is an exciting, life-affirming listen that reminds you it’s never too late to turn things around. In a way, it’s the RAYE story writ large, with absolutely killer choruses”.
There will be some bands included in the dozen Mercury albums shortlist. Maybe three or four tops. One that I feel is possible is Gorillaz for their phenomenal album, The Mountain. Last year saw legends Pulp shortlisted (for More). I feel Gorillaz are worthy, even though they have been together over twenty years. Released on 27th February, The Mountain is the strongest Gorillaz album in some years. UNCUT gave four-and-a-half stars to this wonderful album:
“Even the most English-sounding track here – the drunken, clanking, Jerry Dammers-inspired ska of “The God Of Lying”, featuring a deadpan vocal by Joe Talbot from Idles – comes wreathed in tablas and bansuri flute, like a Bollywood take on “Clint Eastwood” from the first Gorillaz album.
The ecstatic Arabic blip-hop of “Damascus” sees Syrian singer Omar Souleyman and Yasiin Bey (the artist formerly known as Mos Def) trading verses over the pulsating percussion of Viraj Acharya. “The Manifesto” started off with a simple Latin preset on one of Albarn’s vintage home organs and it would have worked perfectly if set to a dembow-style reggaeton beat, but it piles on so many Indian rhythms that it morphs – quite brilliantly – into a piece of heavy bhangra.
And the pulsating synth pop of “The Shadowy Light” is transformed by Bollywood legend Asha Bhosle, now aged 92, with a lyric that sees her welcoming the process of death (“come, oh boatman, lower my boat into still waters/And take me, finally, to the other side”, she trills, in Hindi).
Just as this threatens to look like gap-year fetishisation of brown spirituality, the Kraftwerkian “The Plastic Guru” serves as a welcome rejoinder – an account of Albarn and Hewlett’s Beatles-like visit to an ashram in Rishikesh, where they quickly grew suspicious of their assigned swami (“starring in your own show and selling your snake oil”).
Bleepy analogue synths and a jabbering four-to-the-bar piano are slowly drenched in multi-tracked sitars and the massed ranks of an Indian ceremonial band, as if to desperately assert the guru’s credentials. False idols also dominate the infectiously catchy “The Happy Dictator”, where Ron and Russell Mael from Sparks invoke the spirit of insane autocrats, like Kim Il-sung, whose rule is eternal, even after their death.
Albarn has, of course, explored grief on many occasions – Gorillaz’s “Andromeda”, Blur’s “The Ballad” and the title track to his solo album The Nearer The Fountain… are all mournful elegies to departed friends and loved ones; countless other Blur and Gorillaz songs mourn the death of relationships. You would expect an entire album with death at its central theme to be similarly hymnal, sombre and funereal, but The Mountain somehow manages to be none of these things. Its 15 tracks are filled with cheery major-key singalongs, sitar-soaked synth-pop bangers and whimsical waltzes that serve as ecstatic celebrations of life, rebirth and reinvention”.
Based in Manchester, Mandy Indiana are a band who I think are deserving of award recognition. Perhaps URGH will correct that. It was released on 6th February. Doubling down on the abrasive assault, which is what The Skinny said in their review, URGH might have passed some people by. The Mercury Prize judges would have been all over it:
“From the first serrated riff on Sevastopol it's clear that Mandy, Indiana aren't softening up on their first album for Sacred Bones. Written in an “eerie” studio house outside Leeds doesn't give the same enigmatic appeal as the crypts and caves where they recorded their 2023 debut, but the results are just as frenetic and punishing.
Simon Catling's synths are used to constant disconcerting effect, even when conjuring something resembling a club beat as on Cursive and Magazine. But don't get too comfortable as the electronics are generally subsumed into a vortex of noise or choked-off cries. Most songs strike with intensity from the off, but even in quieter moments the band know how to put you on edge; take A Brighter Tomorrow which drops its sirens in favour of a foreboding trip-hop drumbeat and disembodied vocals.
All songs are sung, rapped or screamed in French so you might not always know exactly what's going on, but the pervasive mood of pain and suffering makes it perfectly clear (and the odd word that doesn't require a translation like 'mortalité' or 'génocide'). The exception is the closing I'll Ask Her, which features a frantic spoken-word takedown of misogynistic culture over gripping noise (reminiscent of aya).
Whether shouting over martial drums, whispering behind thick, smoky synths or rapping against a razorwire guitar, URGH is an exercise in harrowing noise; unapologetically visceral and all the better for it”.
The photo at the top of this feature is of Holly Humberstone. She is a wonderful artist whose latest album, Cruel World, is going to be one of my picks for Mercury Prize glory. The Nottingham-born artist released Cruel World on 10th April. In their glowing review, this is what Under the Radar said about one of this year’s best albums:
“Opening with a brief instrumental that evokes an orchestra tuning up, it morphs into “Make It All Better,” a moody, atmospheric track that seamlessly forms the bridge between her earlier work and this new chapter.
The previous single, “To Love Somebody,” aches with longing yet still bursts with euphoric pop energy, its premise timeless: it’s better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all. Meanwhile, “Lucy” finds Humberstone in more stripped-back territory, its sparse arrangement and whispery vocals working beautifully, before the title track, “Cruel World,” a song Humberstone counts among her personal favorites, strikes the perfect balance between an irresistible, fun hook-laden pop song and one that carries real emotional weight.
On a thematic level, Humberstone turns her attention outward as well as inward, examining how rivalry between women, rather than being innate, is conditioned by a wider patriarchal structure as she looks to embrace something more compassionate and supportive.
What further elevates Cruel World is Humberstone’s emotional intelligence. Even in the album’s darker moments, there is care and understanding in how she navigates her feelings, distilling messy, chaotic experiences into piercingly honest reflections.
The result is her most complete and compelling work to date, a bold, cohesive album that showcases Holly Humberstone as an artist at the height of her songwriting powers, fully in command of her craft and vision”.
Dove Ellis is an Irish artist who is one of the most talked-about artists of the moment. Someone whose debut, Blizzard, is guaranteed toe be on the Mercury shortlist, it could well walk away with the award – and it would deserve to. Not often an Irish artist wins the award. Blizzard is a remarkable album that was released on 5th December. Lots of positive reviews to choose from, but I will go with CLASH and their assessment of the best debut album of last year:
“But the music is never too trapped in nostalgia, even during moments of introspection, such as “I’ll be gone by Christmas” or “I’ll still lift up my feather / That’s how far I will go”. This makes ‘Blizzard’ gorgeous and tangible, open-hearted and unmasked, its warmth and ache laid bare on the surface.
Released together, ‘Pale Song’ and ‘Love Is’ are a double window into Ellis’ songwriting philosophy. ‘Pale Song’ contemplates the deceptive weight of the past, warning listeners not to dwell on it whilst ‘Love Is’ emerges as a manifesto, a mantra and an anthemic celebration of love in its subtleties, “(Love is) A whispered smile and it’s got nothing to lose”, anchored by expansive piano, drums, and fluttering strings.
The joy doesn’t finish there; it grows even more on ‘Jaundice’, whose driving, communal rhythm likens Titanic’s dance scene in ‘An Irish Party in Third Class’, featuring jigs and polkas played by Gaelic Storm. Effervescence continues in full flow, drifting into the warmth of ‘Heaven Has No Wings’, a soft-rock piano track with shades of the 70s.
As a final meditation, everything falls away but Ellis’ heavenly tone and the circling of sparse guitars on ‘Away You Stride’. In loss and lament comes clarity as he reveals, “I shoot at clouds / I stab at lights / I’m ducking in a crowd / I saw you in the absence of light”. The album’s final exhale feels like a quiet wound, leaving listeners suspended in wistful grace.
The release of ‘Blizzard’ is a culmination of the years Galway-born Thomas O’Donoghue has spent honing his craft in Manchester’s live scene and beyond. Fresh from touring with Geese and selling out headline shows, Dove Ellis’ debut translates his quietly magnetic presence into something much larger, one that barely scratches the surface of what he’s capable of. We’re just at the start”.
Cardinals are a sensational bands from Cork. I do think that at least a couple of Irish albums will make it into the 2026 dozen. Masquerade could well be in there. It was celebrated and definitely put the band’s name far beyond their native Cork. Released on 13th February, Masquerade got a lot of love. This is what No Ripcord noted:
“As the first half winds down, Cardinals’ flair for a sullen ballad reveals itself more clearly. Nowhere on the album is this better demonstrated than in the plainly titled “I Like You,” where lead guitarist Oskar Gudinovic adds a slow-paced fingerpicked arrangement set against an endearing accordion accompaniment. “You can have most of me/just don’t stand so close to me,” he passionately declares, grappling with the fleeting glory and confusion of young love.
There is an underlying sense of melancholy to Euan’s lyricism, which the band consciously matches with a sombre mood as the album progresses—a stark difference to the brighter sheen they juxtapose early on. The smoldering delivery of “Anhedonia,” one of the more punk-driven tracks here, has Euan leaning into his storytelling abilities by detailing a tragic character burdened by sin: “Then I stabbed him/I opened up his world/as it spun.” While the contrasts they play with are marked, they’re not necessarily jarring, maintaining a rhythmic pace that sounds forceful yet grounded. Even the heavier, politically charged track “The Burning of Cork,” which veers into post-hardcore territory, adds depth beyond mere anger before it fizzles in two minutes flat.
Masquerade is the type of vital debut that unspools with an unrefined beauty, attracting the opinion of listeners who might think that they're still figuring out their true sound. Whether Cardinals possess the talent to evolve past this fiercely passionate statement remains to be seen, but considering who they’ve been matched against, the band has tapped into a formula that sounds arguably more defined from the outset. Cardinals would be the first to admit that it’s a daunting first step, but it sure is exciting to hear them aim this high”.
In terms of other guaranteed shortlisted albums, The Boy Who Played the Harp is definitely going to be in there. A masterpiece from Dave, it was released on 24th October. Heralding a master storyteller, DIY showed a respect and love for a staggering work from one of our greatest artists:
“This is God’s plan,” begins Dave on ‘History’ – a plan he’s in the process of making happen. He’s got a strong case, too. At 27, with three critically acclaimed LPs under his belt, it feels like the world is running out of superlatives with which to describe him. What more can you say about arguably the UK’s leading rapper? It’s been four years since 2021’s ‘We’re All Alone In This Together’, but Dave hasn’t been totally quiet since then, with standalone Central Cee collab single ‘Sprinter’ becoming a massive global hit in 2023. But it’s been long enough that it’s difficult not to savour every second of ‘The Boy Who Played the Harp’.
Across its ten tracks, Dave is found in an equally introspective and outward-looking mood, with faith also playing a major part in his narrative. ‘175 Months’, named for the length of time his brother has been in prison, is a confession, while on ‘My 27th Birthday’, he questions whether he should speak out about the world’s ills while also enjoying the luxuries that come with stardom. But he’s perhaps at his best here when he has company. James Blake’s presence is a strong one, while Jim Legxacy is a dream on ‘No Weapons’, and Tems brings a lighter tone to the flirtatious ‘Raindance’. The album’s crowning moment, meanwhile, comes with the Kano-featuring ‘Chapter 16’. Alluding to the biblical story of Samuel anointing David as king, it plays out as a conversation over dinner in which Dave gives Kano his flowers and the grime grandee responds in kind. It’s deserved. It all goes to confirm that Dave has grown from hot young talent to a true master storyteller”.
I really love Joy Crookes’s work. I have been a fan for years. Juniper is a fantastic album. It may sound like an outside shot for Mercury inclusion, but I think it should be on the shortlisted twelve. Juniper was released on 19th September. I am going to come back to DORK, as they awarded Juniper five stars:
“Juniper’ is an album borne of one of the toughest times Joy Crookes has ever experienced. Falling in love whilst also falling into an anxious spiral that threatened to ruin all she’d worked for, it is a record with identity embedded into its fabric and explored with Joy’s now trademark delicate yet hard-hitting style.
Sonically and vocally, you’d never know that Joy was going through one of the most unsteady times of her life. Her forthright delivery on delectably domineering ‘Pass the Salt (ft. Vince Staples)’ represents a woman reborn and ready, underlined by unbelievably catchy soulful pop tune ‘Perfect Crime’ and the rich, deep palette of jazz-slash-RnB anthem ‘Mathematics (ft. Kano)’ which allows Joy’s vocal to soar. Meanwhile, explosive brass sections on ‘I Know You’d Kill’ and the hazy, syncopated rhythm of ‘Paris’ transport you to a sleek, smoke-filled jazz club where Joy holds all the cards and owns every inch of the room.
Elsewhere, her softer, more vulnerable side shines through. Whether it’s in the pleading frustration of Western beauty double standards in ‘Carmen’, or in the swirling, off-kilter album opener ‘Brave’, Joy reinforces her ability to show the nuanced and often unsettling nature of simply being human. Equally, ‘First Last Dance’ sees her eyes full of stars as love fills her heart, while ‘Mother’ powerfully paints a picture of someone determined to rise above generational trauma. She’s never been afraid of feeling, no matter how scary it might seem, and she’s commanding that steely, resolute conviction with untold ease.
Joy’s debut album, ‘Skin’, was so good that it won her a Mercury Prize nomination. Somehow, though, ‘Juniper’ might be an even better record, cementing Joy Crookes as one of the world’s most prodigious talents”.
Another album that you may think would be shortlisted but I don’t think will be is Arlo Parks’s Ambiguous Desire. She won the Mercury Prize for her debut, Collapsed in Sunbeams, and she won the Mercury in 2021. However, this album I feel is going to be in the mix. JADE’s THAT’S SHOWBIZ BABY was released on 12th September and was met with critical and commercial success. It is a truly exceptional album, and I hope that JADE is recognised for her incredible debut. This is what DIY wrote in their five-star review:
“Lyrically, too, she always seemed one step ahead: between the sex-positive, feel-good bangers were vulnerable admissions of insecurity amidst the fickle fame machine and eviscerating asides about exploitative industry types (well, one high-trousered, Dayglo-toothed exec in particular). Hers was a run of singles of such consistent quality that you couldn’t help but think - has JADE already played all the best cards in her hand?
In a word: no. The latter half of ‘THAT’S SHOWBIZ BABY!’ is a dizzying journey through genre, era, and Jekyll and Hyde dynamic shifts that more than lives up to the vitality of its previews. ‘Headache’, for example, has all the attitude of a heat-warped Pharrell 7”; ‘Natural At Disaster’, meanwhile, offsets earnest crooning with choral BVs and glitchy, video game-like effects, a Frankensteined collage of the shredded pop ballad blueprint. The album’s only slight stalls come with ‘Self Saboteur’ and ‘Lip Service’ - a pair of shimmering synth-led cuts which, while not bad by any stretch (both recall Caroline Polachek at best, The 1975 at worst) feel frustratingly safe next to the balls-to-the-wall experimentation of the rest of the record. Because, clearly, JADE thrives most when she’s throwing curveballs: namely, the gloriously ‘80s guitar pop of ‘Unconditional’ - which could sit shoulder to shoulder with Pet Shop Boys and Depeche Mode - and The Supremes-sampling ‘Before You Break My Heart’: an impossibly catchy instant-classic that casts her as the natural successor to Diana Ross’ girl-group-to-solo-superstar trajectory. After a career’s worth of constricting, prescriptive pop formula, she’s now finally concocted a recipe for success on her own terms - and it’s anything but vanilla”.
I am writing this before Jessie Ware’s Superbloom is released (17th April), so this might be one album that makes it into a revised feature. For the time being, I will leave the album out. My New Band Believe by My New Band Believe is an album that I do think warrants a Mercury Prize salute. Another incredible debut, it was released on 10th April. It was formed by Cameron Picton, formerly of black midi. NME declared My New Band Believe a masterpiece. Even though the band’s name – and debut album’s title – is pretty dumb and annoying, you cannot deny their album is flawless:
“It’s the kind of ambition that could result in a mess. Thankfully, by imposing the limitation that almost everything on the record should be acoustic, with the smallest possible amount of reverb, Picton ensures that the maximalism is tightly controlled. The way it constantly tries to press against those self-inflicted cast-iron boundaries – like the orchestra in that room – is one of the reasons it’s so thrilling.
Then, there is Picton himself, a dazzling instrumentalist. On ‘Heart Of Darkness’ alone, he flits between serpentine finger-picked guitar and blissed-out soul, envisaging a transatlantic communion between English folk great John Renbourn and American soul legend Otis Redding. To longstanding Black Midi fans such chops will come as no surprise. What’s intriguing, though, is how much he shines as sole frontman.
Lyrically, too, there’s brilliance at work, Picton skipping between the perspectives of different characters, drawing out the intense moments of desire, lust, anger, bliss and despair that exist in intimate spaces. Sometimes these emotions dovetail with the music – the gentle domestic portrait on ‘Love Story’ set to strings that border on saccharine; the skittering rhythms that heighten the paranoid self-consciousness on ‘In The Blink of an Eye’ – and sometimes they’re set in uneasy juxtaposition. There is a simmering violence under the quirky surface of ‘Target Practice’, for instance, a meditation on the ethics of assassination.
Like its name that emerged within that 2023 fever dream, My New Band Believe’s debut is an open-ended record, as ambitious as it is ambiguous. In less skilled hands it could easily fall apart under its own weight. In Picton’s, however, it’s a masterpiece”.
Three more albums to include. Elmiene is an artist who is rightly being talked about as a future legend. A rare talent that comes along every so often. He is a British-Sudanese musician from Oxford. He placed fifth in the BBC Sound Of 2024 poll. His sounds for someone is an immense debut. It was released on 27th March. This is what Shatter the Standards wrote in their review:
“Almost every song on sounds for someone asks for something. “Honour,” with Baby Rose’s voice winding around his in the low end, requests the simplest thing imaginable—believe in me. “I’ve always been the one to doubt myself/Convinced I don’t deserve a ‘someone else,’” he admits, and then spends the rest of the song trying to earn what he’s afraid to expect. “Don’t Say Maybe,” the album’s most rhythmically insistent cut (Ghost-Note and No I.D. supplying a snapping, uptempo groove that breaks from the album’s prevailing warmth), takes the same impulse and strips the patience out of it. “I always hated when you treated me like a child,” he opens, and the chorus is blunt. Just say yes, just say no, don’t say maybe. That directness sounds different for Elmiene. The songs addressed to his father plead and circle. This one draws a line.
Not everything on the album bleeds. “Reclusive” is probably the most fun anyone’s ever had admitting they don’t want to leave the house. Elmiene has credited Biz Markie’s ability to make the mundane memorable, and you can hear that in the way the song zooms into the tiniest details of inertia: wake up, play video games, think you need a change, don’t change. “I ain’t even gonna lie/Not a social butterfly” is as self-aware as this album gets, and the Gitelman production (piano and drums that gradually widen into a busier arrangement) treats his reclusiveness as a fact of life, not a problem to solve. The romantic songs carry more weight than they might on a less emotionally loaded album. “Lie With Me” makes a painful request. Fake it, lie, make me believe what you don’t, just until I can move on. He knows it’s over. He’s asking for one more night of pretending. “Light by the Window” puts Elmiene in a locked room with an empty glass and a double bed, hiding for days by the window, wondering if leaving would make any difference. Saadiq’s presence brings a weight to the arrangement that Elmiene meets without strain, and this section (“Detrimental to my vision/Without my glasses you’re far away with no precision”) is the kind of odd, specific image that separates a good lyricist from someone filling bars.
Ghost-Note and OzMoses Arketex handle the majority of the album’s back half, and their production keeps to a steady, mid-tempo pulse that gives Elmiene room to phrase long. The consistency pays off when the songwriting justifies it (”Lonely People,” a mutual codependence anthem where two people agree to stay small together, gains from the controlled simmer) and drags mildly when it doesn’t (”Special,” a sweet ordinary-day love song, sits comfortably in the same tempo and register as three or four songs around it). But Elmiene’s tenor is a remarkable instrument for this kind of sustained quiet. He dips into falsetto when the lyric needs air and drops to a low murmur when it doesn’t, and neither gear sounds forced. Raised in Oxford by his Sudanese mother, the son of a poet grandmother and a musician grandfather, he sings like someone who grew up in a house where expression wasn’t optional but volume was negotiable. On “Told You I’ll Make It,” he reaches his father’s house, puts the key in the lock, and it won’t turn. “How much have I changed?/Do you hate me now?” He promised he’d be there, and he’s making good. The door is still closed”.
The penultimate album I am including is from Dry Cleaning. Secret Love. The London band released their third album on 9th January. Produced by Cate Le Bon, Secret Love could see them nominated for a Mercury Prize. God Is in the TV awarded it eight-out-of-ten and made some insightful observations:
“Can you, should you judge an album by its artwork? Their previous album, Stumpwork, had a front cover that featured a photograph of a bar of soap decorated with pubic hair spelling out the album title. This time round, the album’s cover artwork features a painting by the Scotland-based Canadian artist Erica Eyres, which shows the band’s frontwoman Florence Shaw having her eye washed by someone largely out of frame, holding Shaw’s eyelid open. Of course, if you only tend to stream or download, this may be a mute point, but is it her eyes that are being opened, or ours?
Quite possibly both, and that should be ears too; artwork showing ears being syringed would have been way too obvious, and the reality is that Dry Cleaning are not an obvious band. Having made two successful albums, they’ve taken their time with this one, and it’s paid off in spades.
That should have been obvious from the release of the opening track last year ‘Hit My Head All Day.’ For those who have yet to hear it, this six minute track served as a call to arms: we’re back, we’ve developed and we’ve moved up a gear or two. Its baseline is as funky as anything (think prime LCD Soundsystem or Tina Weymouth on either Talking Heads or Tom Tom Club records), and the lyrics that take in the mundane but also reach the surreal on a par with The Sugarcubes’ Here Today, Tomorrow Next Week.
There are some things that haven’t changed. Sure, there are still tracks you might not want to play in front of your more prudish relatives. Also (while it would be weird to simply love a group because of what they don’t sound like), it’s impressive that whilst they’ve made their most accessible and best album so far, in this case it is most definitely not a way of saying that they’ve shed their edges that made them so interesting and have become bland enough for mainstream acceptance. Both the band and Shaw have started singing (occasionally), but these are not songs to soundtrack your local beige indie disco. Frankly, it’s all the better for that.
It’s pointless to simply describe this as the first great album of 2026 when we’re not even two weeks in. It is, however, a record that will reward repeated playing, and one that will certainly win them new fans, and rewarding those long-term fans with how much they’ve developed. How long it will be to the next record is anyone’s guess, but we’ve got this and it’s brilliant. For best results, listen to with your eyes closed and just focus on one aspect at a time…”.
People might have their own thoughts about which albums released so far – or between last autumn and now – will be in contention for the Mercury Prize. I am not sure who is hosting this year’s ceremony, though it is likely to be Lauren Laverne. She hosted last year, so I am pretty sure she will host this year’s. The final album I am suggesting is possibly going to be shortlisted is Knucks for A Fine African Man. Released on 31st October, Knucks is a London-born rapper. A hugely acclaimed talent. A fine place to end. I feel this album is a hot favourite to be among the golden twelve that will be in contention on 22nd October at Newcastle’s Utilita Arena. We have a way to go, though the eligibility window closes near the end of August. I will publish another feature nearer the time. Who else can be in contention when we look at the albums already confirmed? Kneecap for FENIAN, Maisie Peters for Florescence and Paul McCartney for The Boys of Dungeon Lane. It would be amazing if Paul McCartney was shortlisted! Also, Ringo Starr releases Long Long Road on 24th April. Two Beatles shortlisted! Neither needs the award, though it would be possibly the last time this is possible. Let’s get back to Knucks, and NME’s review for A Fine African Man:
“Throughout ‘A Fine African Man’, Knucks’ verses move with the rhythm of spoken poetry – like diary entries, all lived-in and unfiltered. But the album’s most tender moment comes on ‘Yam Porridge’, where he recalls his younger self, alone at a Nigerian boarding school, finding home in the solace of a dinner lady who made the best bowl around. Tiwa Savage’s voice drifts in sweetly (“Anything you want, I’m here / Full confidence, no fear”), providing the blissful warmth of motherly comfort. ‘Yam Porridge’ is the clearest evidence that Knucks is one of this generation’s sharpest storytellers – real rap doesn’t need to be lyrically complex or super conceptual: sometimes, simple words work too.
Although this album is a new sonic exploration for Knucks, you can still catch glimpses of the foundation he made for himself. Since his 2014 debut mixtape ‘Killmatic’, Knucks has always favoured groove and rhythm, perfecting the balance between mood and meaning – making the ordinary feel cinematic. On ‘A Fine African Man’, that instinct has matured beautifully. ‘Are You Okay?’ is full of neo-Afrofusion sultriness, all bass warmth and glossy keys, but with depth beneath its glow. ‘Pure Water’ calls back to the sombre drill production that first built his legend, embodying the relentless grind that defines Knucks: always moving with purpose, chasing something real.
All this is done with great Nigerian pride, manifested through bravado. ‘No Shaking’ sees Knucks link up with Phyno, trading bars in their mother tongue over a warping grimetrap-like beat that fuses London grit with Lagos swagger. Then there’s ‘Nkita’ with UK trap disruptor Fimiguerrerro – an aggressive, braggadocious track about being top dog that adds some bite to the mostly mellow record. By the time we get to songs like the chirpy amapiano-style ‘Container’ and the groovy ‘Palm Wine’, it’s a full-blown celebration stretching into the far-flung corners of the diaspora.
‘A Fine African Man’ shines as a vibrant depiction of Igbo culture through the eyes of someone both belonging and (once) an outsider. Using love, struggle, and growth as his colour palette, Knucks paints from memory and discovery alike. If ‘Alpha Place’ reflected London, here, Knucks turns his mirror toward Nigeria, watering his roots through sounds and customs from his motherland. No longer the boy from Kilburn, Knucks stands tall as a fine African man whose talent will never be forgotten”.
Rather than include the entire album for each of my selections, I am instead popping in a song from the album. I would encourage people to check out the albums, but I didn’t think people who read this would listen wholly to every single album, so I thought it was better putting a song in instead. Such a varied collection of artists, my current top-five of sure-fire Mercury nominees would be Dove Ellis, Dave, Olivia Dean, JADE, RAYE and Holly Humberstone. I do think a female artist will win, and the Mercury is not guaranteed to go back to London. In 2024, a female-fronted band English Teacher, won for This Could Be Texas, but Little Simz won in 2022 for Sometimes I Might Be Introvert. English Teacher and Sam Fender from northern England, so two years running it has been awarded to artists outside of London. I think, so far, I would put Holly Humberstone against Olivia Dean as thew favourite, though every album I have included is deserving. The Mercury Prize always throws up surprises and you can never predict. We will see who is nominated in September. In terms of albums that could be in the running, there is…
MUCH more to come.
