Everyone moaning about how bad it is that Lily Allen and pals aren’t on last week’s Mercury Prize shortlist forgets how good it is for the lesser names that have made the cut.

Little-known south London rapper Speech Debelle has now become someone worth talking about. Her thoughtful, gripping debut album, Speech Therapy, will get the attention it needs to become the crossover hit it deserves to be.

Even playing just seven songs third on the bill at a hastily arranged show in Camden’s tiny Barfly venue, the buzz was almost audible. She is an unlikely star with her glasses, chunky sideways hairdo and voice that almost hits squeakiness but she was wonderfully likeable as she teased her all-male band and began weaving her unsparingly honest rhymes.

She might have brought gloom as she told of teenage years in and out of hostels on Searching and a painful break-up on Go Then, Bye — before the more upbeat Spinnin’ she even admitted that on this attempt at a sunny pop song she had ended up rapping about the recession. But she left out Daddy’s Little Girl, her powerful holding of her absent father to account, and the confidence of her delivery suggested that she knows much better times are ahead.  

Her appeal should stretch even to those with no taste for hip hop thanks to a warm acoustic backdrop of guitar, keys, double bass and skittering, jazzy drums. She’s also slang-free, easy to follow and to relate to as she raps about searching for her ex on Facebook and 6am phone calls with a new love.

Is she a Mercury winner? Very possibly. My tenner’s heading her way at William Hill anyway.