Mercury Prize increase of their album "The Seldom Seen Kid" after winning the Prize in 2008. In their winner's speech, Elbow's frontman Guy Garvey said that winning the Mercury Prize was 'Quite literally the best thing that has ever happened to us'. Similarly, sales of The xx's winning album rose by 450% the day after they won the 2010 Mercury Prize and 2013 winner James Blake saw a 2,500% sales increase on Amazon after he was announced as the winner of the 2013 Mercury Prize. 2011 winner PJ Harvey's album "Let England Shake" jumped from number 181 to 24 in the UK
The Mercury News IV. Various staff writers and designers have received awards for their contributions to "West" magazine, a Sunday insert published by the "Mercury News" in the 1980s and 1990s. The "Mercury News" website received EPpy Awards in 1996, 1999, 2009, 2013, and 2014. In August 1996, the "Mercury News" published "Dark Alliance", a series of investigative articles by reporter Gary Webb. The series claimed that members of the Nicaraguan Contras, an anti-government group organized with the help of the Central Intelligence Agency, had been involved in smuggling cocaine into America to support their struggle, and as a result had played a