Lily Allen “22″
On “22″, Lily pierces another cotton candy foundation of cutesy pop with the dark pangs of reality, telling the tale of a woman who, after spending her party-loving twenty-somethings living life without a care in the world, is suddenly slapped across the face with the emptiness of her existence as she edges into age 30.
Stuck with an “alright” job with no true love in sight (“All she wants is a boyfriend/ She gets one-night stands”), the woman teeters on a nervous breakdown, Lily’s mocking hook of “Sad but it’s true/ How society tells her life is already over” echoing within her increasingly distraught brain. Making things even worse, the backing track doesn’t offer any tinge of pity for her, it’s bouncy piano jig nonchalantly rolling along it’s merry way, as if to illustrate all the satisfied same-aged folk around her now nestling into the adult groove they had been working hard to achieve while she was too busy out getting shit-faced on the regular.
Encompassing all that we loved, then briefly grew tired of, then fell in love with all over again about Allen, “22″‘s delicious dose of sugary melody and finely-sharpened songwriting that the every-blogger person can appreciate, perfectly re-asserts why her It’s Not Me, It’s You stands as one of early 2009′s must-have collections.
good