HAYLA became a household name through “Where You Are” with John Summit and Kx5’s “Escape.” Now, the Liverpool-born artist steps into the DARK. A place beyond the lasers and into the silence, where we hear her at her most vulnerable.
Across 11 songs, her sophomore album moves through grief, heartbreak, fear, and the exhaustion of carrying pain you do not always know how to name. The production remains cinematic, but it no longer chases the predictable. Instead, it creates room for the past to begin healing, so the future can become what once felt impossible.
After exhausting this album from front to back over the past few weeks, I can say this album hits me deeper than any full-length released in 2026. Grief is one of the hardest things to carry. Only those who have carried it can truly feel the unanswered heaviness that comes with. “HEAL” opens with the feeling of someone reaching for repair before they are sure healing is even possible. “DARK” sits with absence and the strange warmth that can remain after loss. Then there is “ENOUGH,” the song that cuts deepest.
“ENOUGH” lives inside the quiet terror of believing your love still falls short. HAYLA’s voice rises and gives way with the production, each pulse carrying another wave of doubt. The track does not simply describe what it feels like to be inadequate for someone. It drops you into that feeling, where every unanswered question becomes heavier and every note lands like a bruise.
“NOT HERE” begins hopefully melancholic, then swells into the truth that love no longer can be found between you and another. The lyrics speak to finding that truth in, “it’s not love I can feel it, wish I did but it’s not here anymore.”
That is what makes DARK feel so different. HAYLA can still fill a festival field, but this record is not asking for a crowd. It is reaching for the person listening alone, hoping the music might make the room feel a little less empty.
You can read what the UK artist had to say about the songwriting on this second album below:
“I wrote this album in the darkest period of my life. A time when I wasn’t sure if I knew how to vocalise my feelings and what I had been through. It’s written extremely authentically and for the love of writing, connection and catharsis.”
HAYLA: THE DARK TOUR 2026 – Tickets
8/6 – Chicago, IL – Concord
8/8 – Toronto, ON – Cabana
8/9 – Montreal, QC – Ilesoniq
8/12 – Cambridge, MA – The Sinclair
8/13 – Philadelphia, PA – Underground Arts
8/14 – Brooklyn, NY – Brooklyn Steel
8/16 – Washington, D.C. – 9:30 Club
8/18 – Atlanta, GA – Terminal West
8/21 – Dallas, TX – Studio
8/22 – Austin, TX – Emo’s
8/23 – Houston, TX – White Oak Music Hall
8/26 – Kansas City, MO – The Truman
8/28 – Denver, CO – Ogden
8/29 – Salt Lake City, UT – The Complex
9/2 – Sacramento, CA – Ace of Spades
9/3 – San Francisco, CA – The Regency
9/4 – Los Angeles, CA – The Fonda
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