She has also announced a string of headline shows for the UK and Europe this spring
By Max Pilley 23rd January 2026
Holly Humberstone. CREDIT: Silken Weinburg
Holly Humberstone has announced her second album ‘Cruel World’ and has shared its first single ‘To Love Somebody’ – watch below.
- READ MORE: Holly Humberstone bares her soul
The Grantham singer-songwriter, who won the BRIT Rising Star award in 2022, released the single ‘Die Happy’ in November, her first new music since the 2024 EP ‘Work In Progress’, itself the follow-up to her 2023 debut LP ‘Paint My Bedroom Black’.
AdvertisementNow, she has announced her comeback, confirming that ‘Cruel World’ will be released on April 10 – pre-order your copy here.
The first taste of it is ‘To Love Somebody’, a confessional and boldly vulnerable pop track that sees her singing, “In the movie of your life / You’re the first to die / And the critics called it trash.” Check out its official video, complete with German expressionist film references from director Silken Weinberg, here:
Humberstone has said: “The record explores love as beautiful and inherently painful. In ‘To Love Somebody’, I wanted to capture that contradiction: to love somebody, is to hurt somebody and to lose somebody, well at least you got to love somebody. In order to feel extreme happiness, you have to know extreme sadness. That’s the tension of the record.”
The singer has also announced a string of headline shows in Europe and the UK to come from February to April, including dates in Glasgow, Manchester and Bristol, as well as London’s Shepherd’s Bush Empire on April 2. Tickets are on sale now and you can find yours here.
RecommendedHolly Humberstone will play:
FEBRUARY 9 – AB Club, Brussels 10 – Kulturkirche Koln, Cologne 11 – Peter Edel, Berlin 13 – Nalen, Stockholm 14 – Little Vega, Copenhagen 16 – Zonnehuis, Amsterdam 17 – Les Etioles, Paris
MARCH 29 – Old Fruit Market, Glasgow 30 – New Century Hall, Manchester
APRIL 1 – Electric, Bristol 2 – Shepherd’s Bush Empire, London 12 – Coachella, California
AdvertisementJUNE 7 – Governors Ball, New York City
NME gave ‘Paint My Bedroom Black’ four stars on its release, noting: “Ultimately, ‘Paint My Bedroom Black’ finds the artist trying to do right by her loved ones and make sense of her own turbulent world, but it’s also a cue to listeners that things could go anywhere from here.
“In pursuit of an authentic sound, Humberstone proves that she’s not only inhabiting her own space – and beckoning listeners in – but also building out the walls”.
NME also spoke to Humberstone around the time of that album for The Cover, where she spoke about the challenges of writing music in a male-dominated industry as a woman.
“Things have started to change, but I used to assume it was a rarity to come across a woman in these spaces,” she told us. “It felt like a treat, even. I was so ambitious – and still am – but I had to ensure that I wasn’t letting external pressures impact the music I was making.”
