Lily Allen
Alright, Still

THE REVIEW

The secret always lies in finding the right point of view.

The impertinent girl (and also quite outspoken), but irresistibly charming, who climbed the UK charts and produced the summer hit? The savvy self-promoter who went from her little page on MySpace to become one of the most clicked (sigh) personalities on the web? The daddy's girl with the right connections who at 21 already has her nice multi-million contract with the major of the time? Or, wanting to silence the media hype (MTV Awards do more harm...) and try to consider the substance, an emerging musical talent who lacks neither the right listening nor valid points of reference? Or even, the true and only revelation of the recent English scene, capable of combining a surprisingly (for her young age) musical eclecticism with irreverent irony, ideally picking up the baton from figures like The Street, a.k.a. Mike Skinner?

Lily Allen is, in truth, a bit of all this, but, in the end, all these definitions are at least partial and so perhaps Lily Allen is simply someone who has earned the right to be assessed beyond stereotypes and clichés (or worse still, prejudices). And if you try to do so, you’ll find that "Alright, Still", her debut album, abundantly passes the test.

What surprises about this work is the ability to assimilate the influences of pop, dub, reggae, ska, hip hop without being overwhelmed, preserving the freshness of a pleasantly naive and unpretentious debut. Lily Allen is not Frank Zappa or Beck Hansen, but she doesn’t even try to be. She lays out what she has to offer and lets you take it or leave it, friends as before. As often happens in these cases, the best is elsewhere compared to the chart singles, although the incredibly catchy "Smile", which delighted her record companies, sounds, in its harmlessness, still a bit different from what we are used to hearing at number 1 on the charts. You willingly forgive her that the attention-grabbing opening ("When you first left me I was wanting more / But you were fucking that girl next door") reeks somewhat of a provocation devised at the drawing board. Better, much better, is "Knock 'em Out", in the best style of "white" hip hop—and Allen’s manifesto of female pride (but not at all feminist), an ironic compendium of techniques for brushing someone off ("And no you can't have my number, "Why?" Because I've lost my phone!").

Even better are the contaminations between dub and 60s sounds in "Everything's just Wonderful", a brilliant mix of styles ideally far apart in time, or her personal reinterpretation of the ska-reggae genre in "LDN", once again on sharp lyrics ("A fella looking dapper, but he's sittin with a slapper / Then I see it's a pimp and his crack whore") that contrast with the carefree tone of Allen's music and voice. Further along, "Little Things" is a ballad that finally manages to be romantic, after so much malice, well supported by an R&B structure and a lovely piano base. The album inevitably has its weak points and the fact that they are almost all placed towards the end leaves one to finish listening a bit baffled. "Take What You Take" is an unnecessary conventionally pop piece and "Alfie" is a naive nursery rhyme that really didn’t deserve to close the album.

It's definitely a pity that the worldwide success of this artist risks overshadowing her real qualities, hammering at our ears with the single (or singles) of the moment, ending up putting the character before the music. Beyond the clamor and marketing, there's the simple fact that "Alright, Still" is nothing but a debut of surprising quality, a demonstration that ideas and talent express themselves regardless of the more or less highbrow forms chosen to present oneself to one's audience.