What on earth is Lily Allen doing? As soon as I caught wind of the title of her latest LP, “Sheezus,” I couldn’t help but cringe and then laugh. And then laugh some more. After one listen-through, I stopped laughing but kept cringing. “You’re not sticking to the script, Lily!” I thought. And then the cringe left me and all of the sudden it occurred to me — that’s the point.
There seems to be a formula that female pop stars employ to calculate the recipe for success. I’m not sure who wrote it — it might have been Madonna or Cher — but whoever it was knew one thing: Controversy sells. And what tends to be the most controversial subject these days? Sexuality.
“I’m kind of over getting told to throw my hands up in the air. So there.”
You know these words, don’t you? Lorde’s hit single, “Team” nails it on the head — pop music doesn’t have to be about hollow antics and shallow displays of sexuality! At first it seems like that’s what Lily is trying to accomplish too. And even though she sings on the album’s title track, “I’m switching off / No longer listening / I’ve had enough of persecution and conditioning,” she still couldn’t help but take to Twitter in an attempt to defend her songs.
“I’m sick of explaining my lyrics to people, they’re pop songs, no more, no less. If you don’t get it or like it, look the other way. Simples.”
So while I want to suggest that maybe Lily’s got good motives, it’s beginning to sound like it’s the same old façade after all, albeit a more modestly dressed one.
Much like, “Yeezus” the Kanye West album the title alludes to, “Sheezus” is intended to be a contradiction. It’s a pop album for people sick of pop music. At least, the hypersexualized variety.
“Hard Out Here” lays it out plain and simply: “I won’t be bragging ‘bout my cars / Or talking ‘bout my chains / Don’t need to shake my arse for you ‘cause I’ve got a brain.” It’s not a song for the faint of heart. Lily is not a fan of subtlety, nor is she concerned with being polite. She uses graphic derogatory imagery and spares no curse word to make her point. But even at that, “Hard Out Here” is essentially “Royals” with a Parental Advisory sticker slapped on it.
Lily’s gotten a lot of flack from the press, specifically over the chorus of the album’s title track where she name-drops nearly every female pop vocalist currently in radio rotation. Some have called it mockery, others have suggested she’s calling them out or throwing shade. But that is not what Lily is accomplishing on the track or the album altogether. Instead, she seems to simply be rebranding herself as the anti-pop pop star.
The song’s bridge goes, “I am born again / Go tell all of your friends / Give yourselves to me / I am your leader / Let me be Sheezus.” All the blaspheming and idolatry aside, considering the chorus in contrast to the bridge, it seems that Lily’s not really dissing anyone. She’s just puffing herself up. Simples.
I won’t argue against the album’s catchiness, she really knows her craft. But that might be the only basis on which I could recommend the album. Her language is crude and her subject matter is almost always superfluous. While she might not be following the code of hypersexualized pop music, “Sheezus” is nonetheless calculated. As Lily Allen said herself: They’re pop songs. No more. No less. Do yourself a favor and look the other way.
