One of the most esteemed panels and prizes in British & Irish music has been decided this evening.

Fighting off competition from records like Blossoms with ‘Blossoms’, Dinosaur with ‘Together, As One’, Ed Sheeran’s ‘Divide’, bookies favourite’s Glass Animals with ‘How To Be A Human Being’, J Hus with ‘Common Sense’, alt-J’s ‘Relaxer’, two of our personal favourites Kate Tempest with ‘Let Them Eat Chaos’ and Loyle Carner’s ‘Yesterday’s Gone’, plus Stormzy’s ‘Gang Signs & Prayer’, The Big Moon with ‘Love In The 4th Dimension’ and The xx with ‘I See You’, a winner has been decided.

Sampha has won the 2017 Mercury Music Prize for ‘Process.

Despite a career already spanning a decade Sampha waited until February this year to release his debut album ‘Process’. Having busied himself working with SBTRKT, Solange, Drake and Frank Ocean the time had finally felt right to release an LP. The record is a powerful collection of songs mostly dealing with the topic of grief following the death of Sampha’s mother Binty Sisay in 2015. He co-wrote the track Timmy’s Prayer with Kanye who lost his mother in 2007.

The judges were made up of Phil Alexander, Will Hodgkinson, Marcus Mumford, Harriet Gibsone, MistaJam, Ella Eyre, Clara Amfo, Jessie Ware, Mike Walsh and Jeff Smith.

By the way, big shout to The Guardian for the most cut throat live updates going, especially calling alt-J “An arrogant, talentless pox on the British music scene who really shouldn’t be further enabled”.