Arlo Parks Wins the 2021 Mercury Prize!

Hello.

Of all the awards in the world, the one I love the most is

the Mercury Prize, and the announcement has been made.

Arlo Parks' "Collapsed In Sunbeam" won! Congratulations!

Oh, this makes me so happy. As someone who fell in love with the album the moment it was released in January and wrote a feature article on it, I'm thrilled.

This slightly shy, very earnest, college-student vibe she has is just so endearing. With a sound that feels like a mix of R&B, Radiohead, and Billie Eilish, the melodies themselves are incredibly catchy. The album was already very popular, and even before the ceremony, I heard a lot of buzz from the UK about Arlo. I think that was largely due to her popular personality.

At the ceremony, she sang "Too Good." That way her vocals come in just a little bit late—as I wrote before, it really reminds me of The Cardigans, and watching this video only confirmed that for me.

The best thing about the Mercury Prize is that you get to see live performances from almost all the nominees, and this year was truly spectacular.

Black Country, New Road. This song still has a singer-songwriter feel, but you can see the gap between their "post-rock yet idol-like" appeal even in this performance.

Wolf Alice, aiming for their second consecutive win following their previous album, also gave a cool performance! Ellie, who delivered powerful vocals on their previous winning track "Don't Delete The Kisses," shows off some cute, tongue-tied rapping here.

In any case, the best thing about the Mercury Prize is the variety of nominees. Laura Mvula delivered 80s R&B just like on her album. The keyboard she's holding is nice.

Celeste, who released her album on the same day as Arlo and actually reached number one in the UK with it. She's better live, isn't she? To be honest, the album felt a bit underwhelming, like "neither good nor bad neo-soul."

The real thrill of the Mercury Prize is discovering artists you didn't know before, and it's quite rare for someone like Hannah Peel, who is quite experimental with electronics, to have an opportunity to perform like this.

Jazz is also nominated. I saw Nubya Garcia's name often on year-end best album lists from UK media last year. Jazz is quite vibrant in the UK right now, and I feel like the Mercury Prize is really helping with that.

The veteran band Mogwai was also given a stage to perform. I really think this is the only place where they could perform at an awards show.

Berwyn, who was also on the BBC's "Sound Of" list, performed. The album didn't sell as well as expected, but listening to this, you can see how much potential they have.

Ghetts, who released the most critically acclaimed UK rap album of the first half of this year, also performed. As a music fan, I'm really happy that all these different types of music are introduced at a single awards show.

Unfortunately, there were no performances from Floating Points or Sault. I understand that Floating Points' collaboration with the London Symphony Orchestra and Pharoah Sanders is difficult to recreate, but I really wanted to see Sault. Their existence remains a mystery, as always.

Watching this, I was reminded once again that I wish every award show could be this high-quality and provide a platform for such a wide range of music.