The album kicks off with hit single, “Smile,” a song about the joys of seeing a past lover suffer: “At first, when I see you cry/Yeah it makes me smile, yeah it makes me smile/At worst I feel bad for awhile/But then I just smile.” It jumps into the core of the issue in the very first line where Allen illustrates that she is not one for euphemisms as she explicitly states the wrongdoings of her lover’s cheating heart. “Smile” permeates a type of lazy mid-tempo sound reminiscent of Lauryn Hill but sung with a British accent. It’s a great open, but not the best track on the album; the subsequent twelve tracks prove to be just as finely crafted.
“LDN,” a sunny take on the city of London is much like the album itself: luminous on the outside, but somewhat dark upon a second look. Its trumpet-filled intro sparks with as much energy as a lively salsa dance. “LDN” is about a city laden with charms, but pimps and teenage dirt bags underneath. Sung from the perspective of Lily riding her bike through the capital city because “the filth took away my license,” the song cracks with all the right words and an ironically pop-infused chorus, epitomizing city life.
“Shame for You” and “Not Big” showcases lyrics that are so honestly blunt, it makes you cringe. Like “LDN,” the choruses are impossibly catchy; they almost make you forget what she’s saying, but when certain catch phrases grips your attention, you have to stop and backtrack to make sure you heard what you just heard. It’s not so much profanity as it is honesty that makes this album brilliantly bold. Yet in “Littlest Things,” Allen surprises us with a more vulnerable side of herself, singing of a lover that she can’t quite let go.
Alright, Still additionally brims with the type of socio-economic dissatisfaction reminiscent of Clash ideology. In “Everything’s Just Wonderful,” she sings “I wanna get a flat I know I can\\'t afford it/It\\'s just the bureaucrats who won\\'t give me a mortgage…Oh well I guess I mustn\\'t grumble/I suppose that\\'s just the way the cookie crumbles.” Lyrics like these would make Joe Strummer nod with approval, not to mention the way she sings “crumbles;” the second syllable lingers, making you feel the cookies crumbing right before your eyes. Certainly in “Nan, You’re a Window Shopper” and in “LDN,” there are hints of annoyance with the authority and class struggles, typifying modern day frustrations.
While her drunken rampages are another matter, her musicianship is brilliant; Lily Allen is long overdue. She’s the voice of our current generation, the voice of urban life with all its grit and grime blissfully exposed, and the voice of a dissatisfied middle class in a post-punk era. Part of the appeal lies in her accent and the Brit lingo (using words like “mental” and “flat” in contrast to their American counterparts); her easy, almost conversational way of singing teems with appeal. But mostly, it’s the originality. Alright, Still is anything but formulaic; the sound is one all her whole own, with trumpets, hip-hop beats and sometimes, rocking guitar lines (the opening for “Take What You Take,” for example). There are few albums in which each and every track is a real gem, but this is one of them.
"Alright, Still" is on sale July 17, 2006 from Parlophone.
