November 22, 2025
Lily Allen just shockingly admitted her latest album was "an act of desperation".
The Smile singer released her long-awaited fifth LP West End Girl last month, just days after announcing the surprise project.
Lily also revealed that she wasn't thinking about the record - which she wrote and recorded in 10 days following the end of her marriage to David Harbour, as a "commercial endeavour."
She told CBS News: “At the time I wasn’t really thinking about it as a commercial endeavour, it was just, it was an act of desperation actually.”
“While I was writing it I wasn’t really sure whether it was going to see the light of day up until relatively close to its release. I was always thinking, ‘Is this something I want to share with the world?’ But not when I was writing it because the writing was very much... I hate the word - I don’t hate it but I feel like we hear the words 'catharsis' or 'therapy' in relation to music [quite a lot],” The Fear crooner added.
Lily further mentioned, “It’s an odd idea and an odd question that if you consider yourself an artist that you might think, ‘Should I really be sharing what’s going on in my brain as part of my art?’. That’s kind of messed up, that that is where we have got to as human beings.”
The 40-year-old singer previously insisted West End Girl isn't a "cruel album."
She told Interview magazine: "It’s not a cruel album. I don’t feel like I’m being mean. It was just the feelings I was processing at the time."
"I mean, I wrote this record in 10 days in December and I feel very differently about the whole situation now. We all go through breakups and it’s always f****** brutal. But I don’t think it’s that often that you feel inclined to write about it while you’re in it,” the Not Fair hitmaker said at that time.
"That’s what’s fun about this record; it’s viscerally like going through the motions. At the time, I was really trying to process things and that’s great in terms of the album, but I don’t feel confused or angry now. I don’t need revenge,” Lily Allen concluded.