Artist: Lily Allen
Album: It's Not Me, It's You
Year: 2009
Grade: 3.5 pretzels
So now you know the words to our song
Pretty soon you’ll all be singing along
When you’re sad, when you’re lonely and it all turns out wrong
When you’ve got the fear
These are lyrics from “The Fear”, the opening track of Pulp’s 1998 bloated masterpiece This Is Hardcore. And, as anyone who’s been poking around YouTube for the past several months knows, “The Fear” is also the name of the first single of Lily Allen’s new album. Being the obsessive music fanatic that I am, I can’t shake a feeling that the two are somehow connected. Just look at the chorus of Allen’s version:
I don’t know what’s right and what’s real anymore
And I don’t know how I’m meant to feel anymore
And when do you think it will all become clear?
‘cause I’m being taken over by the fear
The similarities between This Is Hardcore and It’s Not Me, It’s You don’t stop there. Both are defiant “fuck you”s, coming three years after albums that brought them crashing into the social consciousness. Both were made by artists reacting to extreme media overexposure. Both are dramatic shifts in sound and style. But, while Pulp’s Jarvis Cocker could use his poisonous, razor-edged lyricism to slice his targets to ribbons, Lily Allen doesn’t exactly have that talent. Instead, she lets her bubbly personality and natural charisma shine through, seemingly smiling like a lunatic while she cuts her detractors down. It’s an oddly effective way to make an album.
Allen’s lyrics have an incredibly charming honesty to them. When she says “I want loads of clothes, and fuckloads of diamonds” on “The Fear”, in the calmest voice imaginable, you can almost see here winking at you through the record. The hilarious squeakiness of “Fuck You” underscores the bite of the song, hiding the actual bitterness with some acidic comedy. Allen also tones down the snarking once and a while, letting the honesty of her stories rise to the surface, particularly on “I Could Say” and the disarmingly sweet “Who’d Have Known”. Not unlike fellow British songwriter Alex Turner (of Arctic Monkey’s fame), Allen seems to have mastered the art of creating fantastic stories using the tiniest of details (names flashing on phones, specific bottles of wine, etc). These songs really do ring true and you can’t help but feel some empathy for Allen.
That isn’t to say the album doesn’t have a few misfires. The awkwardest moments are when Allen tries to tackle problems bigger than herself. “22”, an overly cliché rant against the media’s bias towards young girls, doesn’t quite deliver, mostly because Allen’s target is too broad for any of the one-liners to really hit a weak spot. The album also includes the excruciatingly heavy-handed “Him”, following in the footsteps of Joan Osborne’s “One Of Us” by asking God all kinds of weighted questions and wondering if, at the end of the day, he’s just like everyone else. Amid an album that rips ex-boyfriends and bloodthirsty critics apart, this somewhat ambivalent musing about God seems out of place.
Lily Allen has certainly had a rough stretch lately. Media harassment, breakups and a tragic miscarriage are more than enough for any single person to deal with. It’s Not Me, It’s You is an incredible positive sign from Allen, proving that she’s capable of turning the problems in her life into some great songs. Despite a few overly preaching tunes, she seems to be coping with the avalanche of issues she’s dealing with. This can only be a good thing.
Pretty soon you’ll all be singing along
When you’re sad, when you’re lonely and it all turns out wrong
When you’ve got the fear
These are lyrics from “The Fear”, the opening track of Pulp’s 1998 bloated masterpiece This Is Hardcore. And, as anyone who’s been poking around YouTube for the past several months knows, “The Fear” is also the name of the first single of Lily Allen’s new album. Being the obsessive music fanatic that I am, I can’t shake a feeling that the two are somehow connected. Just look at the chorus of Allen’s version:
I don’t know what’s right and what’s real anymore
And I don’t know how I’m meant to feel anymore
And when do you think it will all become clear?
‘cause I’m being taken over by the fear
The similarities between This Is Hardcore and It’s Not Me, It’s You don’t stop there. Both are defiant “fuck you”s, coming three years after albums that brought them crashing into the social consciousness. Both were made by artists reacting to extreme media overexposure. Both are dramatic shifts in sound and style. But, while Pulp’s Jarvis Cocker could use his poisonous, razor-edged lyricism to slice his targets to ribbons, Lily Allen doesn’t exactly have that talent. Instead, she lets her bubbly personality and natural charisma shine through, seemingly smiling like a lunatic while she cuts her detractors down. It’s an oddly effective way to make an album.
Allen’s lyrics have an incredibly charming honesty to them. When she says “I want loads of clothes, and fuckloads of diamonds” on “The Fear”, in the calmest voice imaginable, you can almost see here winking at you through the record. The hilarious squeakiness of “Fuck You” underscores the bite of the song, hiding the actual bitterness with some acidic comedy. Allen also tones down the snarking once and a while, letting the honesty of her stories rise to the surface, particularly on “I Could Say” and the disarmingly sweet “Who’d Have Known”. Not unlike fellow British songwriter Alex Turner (of Arctic Monkey’s fame), Allen seems to have mastered the art of creating fantastic stories using the tiniest of details (names flashing on phones, specific bottles of wine, etc). These songs really do ring true and you can’t help but feel some empathy for Allen.
That isn’t to say the album doesn’t have a few misfires. The awkwardest moments are when Allen tries to tackle problems bigger than herself. “22”, an overly cliché rant against the media’s bias towards young girls, doesn’t quite deliver, mostly because Allen’s target is too broad for any of the one-liners to really hit a weak spot. The album also includes the excruciatingly heavy-handed “Him”, following in the footsteps of Joan Osborne’s “One Of Us” by asking God all kinds of weighted questions and wondering if, at the end of the day, he’s just like everyone else. Amid an album that rips ex-boyfriends and bloodthirsty critics apart, this somewhat ambivalent musing about God seems out of place.
Lily Allen has certainly had a rough stretch lately. Media harassment, breakups and a tragic miscarriage are more than enough for any single person to deal with. It’s Not Me, It’s You is an incredible positive sign from Allen, proving that she’s capable of turning the problems in her life into some great songs. Despite a few overly preaching tunes, she seems to be coping with the avalanche of issues she’s dealing with. This can only be a good thing.
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