Lily Allen Album: “It's Not Me, It's You [Clean]”

Lily Allen is not just a pampered, all-drinking, all-blogging celebrity brat made good, but an actual singer with distinctive vocals, cwhose fame is deserved. Happily, her songs still sound as though they were written under the influence of a truth serum. Like her debut "Alright, Still", its successor "It's Not Me,It's You" serves up tuneful veracity.

The opener "Everyone's At It", all set to a suitably addictive synthetic pop tune, uncannily foreshadows the drama that has already surrounded it, a pounding piano and operatic "Ah's" resonate before she chimes in with her straight talk, about drug-taking, legal and illegal: drugs are bad, don't take them...although "the kids are in danger" is hardly the most insightful lyric on the subject.

More sincere sounds "The Fear", her agreeably potty-mouthed comeback single, an electropop polemic against celebrity culture which has just topped the UK singles charts.

The track is even friendlier to American ears than the singles from "Alright, Still", thus Lily could follow Leona Lewis and Coldplay into the Billboard top ten.

For the most part, the album is a stylistically bold collection of everything we've come to know and love about Lily Allen.

She is not a bad storyteller, but that's the fame game, she needs to keep spinning the stories.

It is all co-written and produced by Greg Kurstin, the man who has sprinkled magic studio dust over the work of Britney Spears, Kylie Minogue and All Saints. Their best moments are the gentle techno hoedown of "Not Fair", and the pseudo-handbag house of "Back To The Start", with Lily's talent for motor-mouthing Cockney clicking through the gears.

Producer Greg Kurstin has done a deft job of throwing her around genres (electronic pop, country, the klezmer madness of "Never Gonna Happen") but sometimes it is at the expense of her warmth.

It's good, but not perfect. Her voice will never be the strongest one.

This is undeniably pop.

But it's absolutely nice occasionally to hear a pop starlet mouthing just a little truth.

"Lily Allen is back where she belongs - in your head all day, with a melody that won't go away". - Lewis Bazley

Overall Grade: B+

Hilights: Everyone's At It, The Fear, Not Fair, Never Gonna Happen, F*** You, Chinese

Lily Allen is back, and still shameless. "It's Not Me, It's You" is a brilliant sophomore record that combines silly romantics and societal views with her usual brutal honesty and cynicism. While upbeat, fun, and slightly intoxicating, Allen's focus has shifted into a bit of broader and more serious thinking (as evident in the album's opening track, "Everyone's At It"). Still, she could care less what anybody thinks. "F*** You" is a whimsical biggot basher and "Chinese" is just too cute! Fans of her first album should eat this right up.

... I heard "The Fear," song on the radio and thought hmmm... I like that song, who's that? Not really knowing much about Lily Allen I went ahead with my purchase of the It's Not Me, It's You CD.

I LOVE the entire Cd!!

The CD doesn't have typical popular songs but it sounds FANSTASTIC. Lily's British accent rocks. The songs are electrical, melow, fun to listen to with a lot of intelligence and personal phrases.

Fun CD to listen any time of the day.

I actually had friends over the other night and we were hanging out, eating, drinking wine and listening to this CD.

I am new to the art of Lily Allen. I just discovered her a month ago, but have fallen into her grip more than any other artist has been able to do for a long time. This CD is 100% great all the way through. No fillers. No duds.

It's Not Me, It's You by Lily Allen is the coolest album of 2009 so far. I don't have her debut album yet so I really can't compare the two but I am very happy with this pop/alternative/dance record. Allen's voice just puts me in a good mood, she's not the strongest vocalist but these songs are so catchy - you can't help but sing-along! My favorite song is Not Fair, it has this country-twinged flavor to it - it's pretty addicting! The irrestible F@*k You and the techno trippy Everyone's At It are also standouts. I actually enjoyed every song, you get a little bit of everything, her lyrics are blunt but her voice is so angelic - it's a nice balance. I highly recommend this overlooked gem, enjoy!