Lily Allen surprised us with her fifth studio album, West End Girl, at the end of October. It is a brutal, witty and honest recount of the painful crumbling of her marriage with David Harbour. Allen has never been one to conceal her most raw emotions, nor to spare the feelings of others in her music. Since her 2006 debut Alright Still, she has been singing about how her lover “never made her cum,” and then in a similar vain on her 2009 record It’s Not Me, It’s You, she sings about how unfair it is that her boyfriend is bad in bed, along with a track called “Fuck You,” a letter to American president, Donald Trump. She is unafraid and utterly shameless, and it is her total lack of Disney-washed media training, which is so prevalent in today’s ‘perfect pop-girl,’ that has drawn so many to fall in love with her personality and music over the years. That, and her quirky sonics, ranging from ska-influenced pop to twee to a more modern reggae-inspired electro pop on the appropriately titled 2018 album, No Shame. Her recent album, West End Girl, most certainly delivers in the unabashedly unashamed-department.
Listening to the album front to back for the first time felt like watching an episode of a reality TV show. There were cliff hangers, nail-biting twists and turns, and sad moments all packaged together with a touch of ironic, self-deprecating British humour. It left the listener searching for more information, googling the details of the Stranger Things star and wondering, yeah, who the fuck is Madeline!?
She divulges the turn of events that led to the demise of her relationship, starting with the pair becoming long-distance, to Harbour asking for an open marriage, to discovering that he has been breaking the boundaries that were agreed upon within said open marriage- to get the full picture, you really have to listen to the album. What is so satisfying about this album is the total lack of metaphors. Lily has joined the Charli XCX / Brat school of thought in that her lyrics feel like a private text exchange that we have, for some reason, been granted access to. She also seems to have been inspired by Charli’s modern use of auto-tune for stylistic purposes; songs like “Ruminating” and “Relapse” pair together 808s and UK garage beats with repetitive auto-tuned hooks. I find this to be a really beautiful full-circle moment because it is no secret that Charli has been massively influenced by Lily Allen over the years in the way that she speaks truth on her songs, and isn’t scared to be perceived as imperfect and flawed in the media. All that is missing now is a collaboration between the two pop icons.
Lily also sticks to a very classic Lily sound with catchy melodies, such as on “Pussy Palace,” a song about her sex-addicted ex-husband, and “Tennis,” the tale of how she found out about David’s affair with Madeline. She is more vulnerable on tracks like “Nonmonogamummy” and “Beg For Me,” in which she explains the lengths to which she has gone, trying to make her marriage work, and just wanting her husband to want her.
This is not necessarily Lily Allen’s best album to date, as there are some moments of cringe on the album, including track titles like “4chan Stan” and, of course, “Pussy Palace,” but I do think it gave her fans a lot to chew on. It is also a beautiful display of female vengeance, and should be a warning to everyone never to fuck with Lily Allen.
