What does it mean to be a pop star in 2014? With a changing landscape and a necessity to be more disposable, there is a chance that the music needs to be more vapid than ever. Performers need to be flashier and impulsive in ways that have made Katy Perry more than a one-hit wonder about girl lip-locking. Even Beyonce managed to make it onto Time's 100 Most Influential list this past year. Even then, it's getting harder to get recognized for your work without seeming like another face in the crowd. On her third album and first in five years, Lily Allen returns with "Sheezus": a statement about the modern scene with all of the bells and whistles to keep you grooving.
Allen is a singer all too familiar with trying to spark controversy. Her debut album "Alright, Still" was a biting analysis of being a celebrity with her own personal tales of clubbing and talking to her drugged out brother (who you may now see on Game of Thrones). It's 10 years later and even if she still has the satirical wit that makes her charming, even the ideals she has talked about have changed. Culture is more present and ready to be dissected for meandering concepts. With that comes an older and wiser pop singer who may be out of her league with everyone else, but packs a punch for those that listen.
If this wasn't apparent, the opening track "Sheezus" declares her ambitions for the album to proceed. She doesn't want the vapid culture of Beyonce, Perry, or Lady GaGa; all of whom have phenomenal Twitter presences. She wants to be the female Jesus of the pop world. It is a bold statement, especially for a performer with long gaps between albums. Even then, the opening track bursts with synthesizers and catchy hooks in ways that even for a moment, make you believe that she has a case. She is an outlier pop star now, and what she has to say is more than love and the marriage. She wants you to know that the world doesn't have to be this insanely vapid.
The album continues with airy, poppy jams like "L8 CMMR" and "Air Balloon," both of which are very light in atmosphere. The tracks rely on poppier techniques that are reminiscent of Gwen Stefani and even her second album "It's Not Me, It's You" which manages to mix romance with nuanced electro beats and personalized inscriptions of love. While the former's title does suggest that she is going a little too tongue in cheek, the track does deliver plenty of peppy energy and is immediately enjoyable. It does feel a little like the music she derails against, but "Sheezus" is an album best indulged not only as a diary, but as the catchiest bummer mother album of the year. She has always been concerned about her image, but now she wants to better the music world. Consider her a humanitarian, though a desperate one at points.
As the album progresses, she replaces the paparazzi of her earlier music with the internet. In the track "URL Badman," she takes on an identity of a male who lives in his parent's basement and doesn't troll the internet, but makes profound statements. For all of the obvious jabs that are done through irony, it is creative streaks like this that benefit the album's authenticity. She turns talk of the people who make the internet a horrible place into one of the album's best songs and even makes it sound like a great thing. She by no means condones pissing off the internet, but "URL Badman" and its misleading irony makes a fun case.
The album's diversity starts to also show up as the album continues. Despite being all fashioned into a technical landscape of electro-pop, there are guitars and familiar kitschy Caribbean techniques that add a sense of novelty. While the themes of love and mothering may be a rampant theme, it doesn't stop her from dismissing the importance of Instagram and that online culture is actually kind of stupid. In a sense, her quest to be the best fails because she wants to improve the world. Pop music of her style may be productive, but it is too populated by the flavor of the month culture for this album to feel like more than a delightful fever dream. She can be "Sheezus," but it is doubtful that she'll ever be Beyonce level of adored.
Everything ends with the song that brought her back into attention. "It's Hard Out Here," much like "URL Badman," exists to subvert ideals of the media. It wants to highlight why demeaning women is a terrible idea by declaring "It's hard out here for a bitch." She doesn't mean it in a derogatory sense, but instead as a think piece. It is in these moments that her music reaches maximum potential. The track is catchy and her take on physical and sexual obsessions become clear. In a time where her counterparts from a decade past, notably Avril Lavigne's desperate "Hello Kitty" video, she has managed to feel like an authentic performer.
Maybe not all of the songs are immediate hits. Even then, in a time where the idea is to go bigger and skimpier, it is refreshing to hear Allen doing something authentic. Even if the motives of the album aren't hypothetically possible, it is fun to dream of a better world where culture isn't so scandalous and vapid. In that regards, "Sheezus" shows the return of reason in one of the most accessible ways. Allen is older and wiser now, so why aren't her peers?
Rating: 3.5 out of 5
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