Lily Allen: It's Not Me, It's You
Lily says it's not her, it's you, on album two
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Monday, 09, Feb 2009 02:12
Parlophone, out February 9th.
In a nutshell...
Ethereal, soothing, hook-laden, accomplished second album
What's it all about?
Album two from the 23-year-old Brit and Grammy nominee sees her returning to work with Greg Kurstin, co-writer of three tracks for her debut and one-half of indie-pop duo the Bird and the Bee. After documenting her hometown, her immature younger brother and the highs and lows of a failed relationship on Alright, Still, Lil's targets this time around include casual drug use (Everyone's At It), God (Him), George Bush (F**k You), her envied older sister (Back to the Start) and her actor father Keith Allen (He Wasn't There)
The Fear, an electropop polemic against celebrity culture, has just topped the UK singles charts.
Who's it by?
Cockney ragamuffin-cum-private schoolgirl Lily Allen, who shot to fame in 2005 when early MySpace demos convinced hundreds to attend her first gig while the endorsement of the Observer Music Monthly convinced Regal Records to allow Allen to work with producer Kurstin and someone called Mark Ronson...
Transatlantic chart success, Brit and Grammy nominations and lots of column inches followed thanks, in no small part, to Allen's celebrity lineage and her enviable talent for commenting honestly on drugs, sex, alcohol and fellow celebrities.
As an example...
"I'm not trying to say that I'm smelling of roses/But when will we tire of putting s**t up our noses/I don't like staying up/Staying up past the sunlight/It's meant to be fun and it just doesn't feel right." - Everyone's At It
"Life's about film stars and less about mothers/It's all about fast cars and cussing each other/But it doesn't matter cos I'm packing plastic/And that's what makes my life so f*****g fantastic/And I am a weapon of massive consumption/And it's not my fault it's how I'm programmed to function." - The Fear
"I'm so pleased I never gave up on him/Oh well you wouldn't believe some of the things that he did/And everyone said you have to give him some time/And I'm glad I gave it to him cause now everything's fine." - He Wasn't There
Likelihood of a trip to the Grammys
Brit nominations are a certainty and with the likes of The Fear even friendlier to American ears than the singles from Alright, Still, Allen could follow Leona Lewis and Coldplay into the Billboard top ten.
What the others say
"It was always her ability to deliver lines that made you blush, giggle or wince in equal measure that really made Allen interesting. Add to that an ability to appear vulnerable and her butter-wouldn't-melt vocal range, and It's Not Me, It's You taps into exactly what fans both want and expect to hear. Even if they're still none the wiser as to what's really behind those headlines." - Rosie Swash, Guardian
"While there's nothing quite as hugely hooky as Alright singles Smile and LDN, the album feels more confidently complete. Lily is still fiery in all the right ways; she's just not getting burned by her own flame." - Josh Modell, Spin
So is it any good?
For the most part, it's a stylistically bold collection of everything we've come to know and love about Lily Allen. Eye-opening, heart-on-sleeve lyrics, hooks that burrow their way into your subconscious despite sometimes reminding you of a rubbish kids' TV show and, most of all, her singular brilliance in combining heartfelt sentiment and some thoughts that would be best left private with a melange of genres.
Not that it's perfect. Her voice will never be the strongest and her habit of down-to-earth Mike Leigh miserable portraits of human error has been a little usurped by Kate Nash and the rise of anodyne, nu-soul dullards (step forward Duffy and Gabriella Cilmi) - though their vocal superiority is irrelevant given the utter lack of. well, soul in their assembly line ballads. While producer Greg Kurstin introduces warm bleeps and blurps to drug confessional opener Everyone's At It and number one The Fear in the hope of steering Allen's sound from reggae-lie to electropop, this is undeniably pop and won't shock those who buy their music in Tesco (in the way a La Roux or Little Boots album would). In fact, it's only Lily's distinctive vocals and honest lyrics that prevent people from presuming this is the far duller Jem.
There's also some musical choices that blindside the listener and veer wildly between innovative and annoying. The eastern European/country swagger of crap sex lament Not Fair brings to mind the Rawhide theme and is only saved from novelty pop hell by Allen's typically eye-opening lyrics - though Kurstin should hang his head in shame for the god-awful banjo/breakbeat middle eight. A honky-tonk solo ruins the soothingly catchy 22. Never Gonna Happen's accordion/handclap opening feels like the French version of an In the Night Garden song - oddly, for a song about a fizzled non-starter of a relationship. And Allen's apology to her older sister on Back to the Start kicks off with a cynical electro shimmer designed to make the listener think ' Ooh, this sounds a bit like Klaxons. '
But in its strongest moments, this is an unbeatable pop album. The tongue-in-cheek brilliance of number one The Fear was somewhat lessened by Lily's recent bum-baring appearance in Agent Provocateur lingerie but it still remains a blindingly catchy treatise on our celebrity obsession (of which she's a definite beneficiary). Carpe diem declaration I Could Say seems set for a top five berth with its soaring, piano-led orchestral ascent that induces goosebumps and the hilarious combination of Brady Bunch-esque piano and anti-Bush lyrics on F**k You will ring through festival arenas this summer. Even though it's a Take That-endorsed Shine rip-off, Who'd Have Known is a heartbreakingly tender tale of those thrilling first days of a new love while you can't help but smile at the rhyming couplets of Him. The jazzy climax of He Wasn't There ends the album on a damp squib but after a terrible TV show, personal tragedy and courting the press with comments that must make her publicist scream, Lily Allen is back where she belongs - in your head all day, with a melody that won't go away.
7.5/10
Lewis Bazley