Lily Allen Snubs Ivor Novello Awards After Snub

She has spent the past year carefully curating the image of a woman reborn: the wounded pop star back from heartbreak with a confessional album and the sort of glowing reviews money can’t buy.

So with ’s comeback narrative now in full swing, Thursday night’s Awards ought to have been the perfect moment to savour it.

Instead, while the great and good of the songwriting world filed into London’s Grosvenor House Hotel for the notoriously star-studded ceremony, hosted this year by Blur frontman , Ms Allen was nowhere to be seen.

And according to multiple music industry sources, there was a very specific reason why.

The Smile singer, 41, had been expected to collect the Outstanding Song Collection prize at the ceremony after her comeback album West End Girl was also shortlisted for Best Album.

But when that prize instead went to Irish singer CMAT for her acclaimed Euro Country LP, insiders claim Ms Allen was left ‘sulking’ and opted to snub the event altogether.

‘It's pretty bad form not to turn up. Lily apparently thought she deserved a more high profile prize. But she made herself look stupid by not turning up to get the one she had won,’ one record industry source told the Daily Mail.

‘Her no show stood out like a sore thumb on the night. The Ivor's still remains one of the most prestigious events in the music industry calendar.’

Indeed, her absence appeared all the more conspicuous given she was the only major no-show on the night attended by everyone from Sir Elton John and Harry Styles to Sam Fender and Calvin Harris.

But the biggest irony of all, perhaps, is that Ms Allen's alleged awards snub comes at a moment when cracks are already beginning to show in the glossy narrative surrounding her much-hyped return to music.

Next week she is due to headline Mighty Hoopla festival in south London’s Brockwell Park alongside Jessie J, JLS and Tulisa before embarking on further tour dates across the UK.

Yet despite the supposed frenzy surrounding her return, hundreds of tickets for her tour remain unsold across multiple venues.

Seat maps viewed by the Mail show entire untouched rows still available just weeks before performances, while swathes of resale tickets suggest many fans who did initially buy seats are now trying to get rid of them.

And those who have attended the tour have not all left impressed.

At one recent Glasgow concert, audience members were left baffled after Ms Allen failed to appear on stage for almost the first hour of the evening.

Instead, fans who had paid up to £200 watched three cellists perform instrumental versions of her songs while lyrics flashed karaoke-style across giant screens.

'Lily Allen, £200 for the first half to be only karaoke, who approved this?' one fan wrote online, while another said: ‘I've not listened to the album since I saw her live. It felt like a pop culture moment in time and wore off quickly.’

And while Ms Allen may have stayed away from Ivor Novello Awards this year, the rest of the industry’s heavyweights happily turned up.

Fender, 32, was named Songwriter of the Year, while Rosalia, 33, won International Songwriter of the Year.

Sir Elton, 79, received an Academy Honour and was unveiled as The Ivor Academy’s first ever president, while Radiohead frontman Thom Yorke, 57, and the late George Michael were awarded fellowships.

Elsewhere, Scottish DJ Calvin Harris, 42, picked up the Music Icon award and 25-year-old rising star Lola Young secured the PRS For Music Most Performed Work prize for her hit Messy.

Away from the music, meanwhile, Ms Allen’s increasingly lavish spending habits have also become a talking point following the success of West End Girl.

Just weeks ago she splashed $50,000 (£37,227) on diamond jewellery during a shopping spree in Atlanta, paying in huge wads of cash carried inside her £14,000 Hermès Birkin handbag.

Earlier this year, the Mail on Sunday also revealed Ms Allen was house-hunting in the affluent celebrity enclaves of Notting Hill and Primrose Hill with a budget stretching to £5million.

‘Lily is flashing the cash and she wants to find the perfect home,’ one source said. ‘She is starting afresh after her split and wants the right property for herself and her two daughters. She’s looking at many places to find the right one.’

The spending spree came despite Ms Allen admitting late last year she had been ‘shopping like an insane person’ following the success of West End Girl.

‘I'm convinced I'm a billionaire,’ she said at the time, revealing she had sought therapy for a shopping addiction. Among the splurges were a £120,000 Porsche and a £16,500 Hermes handbag.

The singer has also recently returned to celebrity video platform Cameo, where fans can pay £376.50 for a personalised message from the singer, compared with the £187 she was charging when last on the site in 2021.

At an average runtime of just 44 seconds, admirers are effectively paying nearly £9 per second for the privilege. Even simply messaging Ms Allen on the platform costs £4.31.

The singer, of course, is no stranger to monetising her fame in unconventional ways.

In 2024 she launched an OnlyFans account devoted entirely to photographs and videos of her feet after a pedicurist told her she had nice feet and could make money with them.

She later revealed that she made more money each month this way than she does through her Spotify streams.