Elton John calls upcoming Lola Young track ‘D£aler’ “the biggest smash I’ve heard in years”
Elton John has called a track from Lola Young‘s upcoming album “the biggest smash I’ve heard in years”.
The song in question is ‘d£aler’, taken from the former NME Cover star’s forthcoming album ‘I’m Only Fucking Myself’. The record will drop on September 19 via Island/Day One – pre-save/pre-order here.
In the latest episode of Elton John’s Rocket Hour on Apple Music 1, John told Young: “I have to say, after listening to the album, there’s a track on your album which would be the next single, I’m going to tell everyone it’s called ‘d£aler’. And if that isn’t Number 1, I bet my house that that’s a Number 1 single.
“I bet my house. It is fucking amazing. It’s unbelievable. It’s the biggest smash I’ve heard in years,” he continued.”
Produced by frequent collaborators Manuka and SOLOMONOPHONIC (Doja Cat, SZA), Young has described the upcoming record as “my ode to self sabotage, my chance to claw myself back from the edge of defeat” on social media.
So far, Young has previewed the “liberating and sexy” single ‘One Thing’, which she said “highlights sex being both a fun and light thing, not always meaningful, as well as showing how gender roles can be reversed,” and ‘Not Like That Anymore’.
‘I’m Only F**king Myself’ will serve as follow-up to her 2024 debut album ‘This Wasn’t Meant For You Anyway’, which featured her breakout viral hit ‘Messy’.
Speaking on ‘Messy’, John said: “‘Messy’ was the record that really launched you into the stratosphere. It was such a great song and I loved the video because you were performing in the video and you thought, “Wow, this is a proper artist. This is a real artist. This isn’t some pop star who’s doing a video of miming and so forth.” This girl is unreal.
“I don’t want to make comparisons, but Raye is the same as you, she’s a great artist, she gives out so much of herself,” he continued. “What I love about you, you are there. What you see with Lola Young is what you get. And what you get is fucking great … Well, the thing about you is that you are authentic. And there are so many girls around now that are authentic. The girls are truly leading the charge.”
NME caught up with Young when she received the Rising Star Award at this year’s Ivor Novello Awards.
The singer told us about the background of ‘Messy’, which ranked as one of the biggest songs of 2025 so far. “I just wrote it from a really personal place and it can sometimes be re-triggering hearing that song because it was so intense,” she told us at the awards ceremony. “I’m out of that place now, out of that difficult time in my life.”
“I think it’s just a relatable song. A lot of people don’t feel like they’re enough for somebody; they don’t feel like they’ll ever win.”
Elsewhere, Young recently announced a 2025 UK tour, set to kick off in October. You can see a full list of dates here, and buy your tickets here.
It follows her debut Glastonbury performance last month. In a round-up of the best sets from the weekend, NME wrote: “A lot has changed for Lola Young since she first performed at Glasto back in 2022. Returning now having played at the BRITs, graced the NME Cover and having her song ‘Messy’ reach over 700million streams on Spotify, there is no doubt that this moment on the Woodsies stage was a powerful one for the London singer.
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Laura Molloy
NME
