Holly Humberstone Goes Into Dark Fantasy Mode On New Album ‘Cruel World’

In only five years, English singer-songwriter Holly Humberstone has seen success most artists can only dream of. From winning a BRIT Rising Star Award to playing major festivals like Coachella and Glastonbury and even opening for stars like Olivia Rodrigo and Taylor Swift, her career has seemingly played out like a fairytale. But it’s easy to forget that Cinderella didn’t start out as a princess.

With her latest album Cruel World, due out Friday (April 10), Humberstone incorporates the dark fantasy aesthetics of some of her favorite childhood classics, including Alice in Wonderland and James and the Giant Peach, while navigating the harsh reality of modern society as a young woman. The project is anchored in a new sense of belonging, rather than the constant turbulence of Holly’s life only a few years before.

Her debut album, 2023’s Paint My Bedroom Black, was written during a self-described “angsty teen phase,” during which Humberstone was constantly on the road, using bits and pieces of spare time on a bus or in a tiny hotel room scribbling down lyrics late at night.

Meanwhile, the production process of Cruel World began after she returned last September to London, where the singer was reminded of how things used to be when she was young.

“This album feels more like how I expected my music would sound when I was 11 or something, you know?” she tells Genius.

Over the past couple of months, she finally had the time to start moving things out from her childhood home in the Midlands. Day by day, she had the opportunity to reflect on the past while helping her parents sort through 25 years of forgotten belongings. What once was a servant’s quarters for a nearby castle in the English countryside became a spooky, but ultimately soothing, sanctuary for the singer from her younger years until now.

“I rediscovered so much of myself through that process, finding items that I used to treasure and that used to hold so much meaning for me: a jewelry box, a Brother’s Grimm book of fairytales, my old ballet shoes,” she says. “The older I get, the more I’m trying to get back to who I am at my core.”

To Humberstone, this means leaning into personal experiences as well as those of the people closest to her. Back in 2024, she bought a rundown house in Southeast London with two of her sisters and her best friend Scarlet at an auction. Their mission was to put it back together, and Humberstone made it a point to paint her bedroom pink, signaling a new beginning. With the four of them finally at the cusp of adulthood, they began to lean more on one another when things got difficult.

In fact, the inciting incident for the album’s lead single, “To Love Somebody,” was a breakup one of her sisters went through. The synth-pop track is bright and upbeat, a far cry from the more somber tones listeners might associate with the theme of separation. But instead of lyrics that mourn what once was, Holly leans into acknowledging negative emotions and then moving forward.

“I felt it really viscerally because we’re very close,” Humberstone says. “I wrote ‘To Love Somebody’ because I wanted to give her something that felt like a positive affirmation. Like it’s OK to be feeling really rubbish right now because you’re gonna be in love again one day. This will be behind you, and this will be a learning curve.”

Still, one of the main things Humberstone stresses is that it’s better to have loved and lost than to have never loved at all.

“Some people go through their whole lives without ever experiencing love,” she says. “And I think that anybody who has felt it, even if they’ve lost it, is a really lucky person.”

The alt-pop ballad “Die Happy” takes on another aspect of relationships, expressing what it’s like to fall into love fully but also recklessly. Her beautiful, tender voice and backing synths mesh seamlessly, shaping a relaxing and nostalgic sound.

With Cruel World, Humberstone felt as though she was finally in a position where she could take agency and make the kind of album she truly wanted. This included having more control, particularly regarding the thematic direction of the album lyrically and artistically.

“I feel like I’ve been in the industry for a long time now, and even though it might sound really obvious, this past year has been a bit of a revelation,” she says. “I hope people feel that kind of confidence.”

The women in Humberstone’s life, including her mother and three sisters, have always been important in the shaping of who she is. She even tapped her sister Eleri to help out with the Cruel World visuals alongside creative director Silken Weinberg. Together, they were able to concoct a unique style that encapsulates the world Humberstone always wanted to create, evoking the same feeling of opening a dusty old book and stepping into the fantasy story inside.

The songwriting was largely a product of teamwork with long-term producers Rob Milton and Nate Campany. But compared to Humberstone’s first album, a much larger portion of the team working on the artistic side of the album were women.

“It was so much more collaborative than anything I’ve experienced before,” she says. “Making music videos and coming up with the creative concept has been so fun. I love women, and I love being a girl and getting to share my life with other girls. It is amazing.”

Admittedly, however, Humberstone didn’t always have that mindset. She remembers how, growing up, there was always a sort of pressure to compete with others, which was only amplified by the fact that she went to an all-girls school.

“It’s something that I’ve really had to unlearn as I’ve gotten older,” she says. “I don’t think competitiveness was naturally within us as children, but I think it was something that was put on us externally. Prettiness and being able to perform, have stamina, and work really hard is seen as currency. But there’s space for everybody to succeed, and we should be empowering each other rather than seeing each other as competition, because that’s just stupid!”

Her time on tour with Olivia Rodrigo emphasized this view on camaraderie even more. Humberstone remembers it was highly affirming to find out that an artist she had always admired wanted her to open for her.

“It made me feel like I’m doing a good job,” Humberstone says. “If they like my music, then I must be on the right track! And I learned a lot about performing through watching her. Olivia is a rock star. She is such a force and has this confidence that doesn’t come across as cringe. She just owns herself.”

Humberstone’s next live performances will be at festivals all around the United States, including Coachella, Governors Ball, and Bonnaroo. She took a bit of a break from attending festivals over the last couple of years while working on her songwriting, and she missed them to the point of shutting her phone off completely during festival seasons in order to avoid FOMO.

Some of her favorite festival memories are of Leeds, a rite of passage in the U.K. for music-loving teens after finishing their GCSEs and A-Level exams, and the entire flower crown era of the mid 2010s, often associated with Lana Del Rey. One goal of Holly’s is to return to Glastonbury in 2027, citing the time she went to that festival as “the best weekend of my entire life.”

Other than that, Holly’s future aspirations are a bit different than most artists. They have nothing to do with venue sizes, charts, or even money. Rather, she aims to make even more memories with those that she loves while continuing to do what she loves.

“I just want to tour and make sure that I’m just soaking it all up and keeping a record of what’s happening by keeping a journal and taking lots of pictures,” she says. “I think it’s such a special job that I get to do, and I feel like the novelty has not really worn off yet that I get to do this as a career. Even if it was all ripped away tomorrow, I’ve had a really amazing shot at it.”