Mercury Music Prize: the biggest success stories - and failures
Coveted award doesn't always spell stardom
- Failure - 2000, Badly Drawn Boy; the indie singer-songwriter and serial hat wearer, real name Damon Michael Gough, was awarded the Mercury for his album The Hour Of Bewilderbeast. Previously to this, Gough hadn’t enjoyed much commercial success and unfortunately he didn’t enjoy much afterwards, with this album being recognised as the critical and commercial peak of his career.
by Andrew Trendell | Photos by WENN/Rick Caughey
Tags: Mercury Prize
Every year, the Mercury Prize nominees are announced to a flurry of debate. When an artist wins that award, it's the peak of their career.
However, what follows is not always superstardom and a long and fruitful career. In fact, while they may briefly find their albums adorning coffee tables around the world, winning the prize has sounded the death knell for many musicians.
From Arctic Monkeys to Speech Debelle (anyone...?), we've pulled together the success stories and the less successful stories of some of the winners from the past 21 years.
