In October of last year, Lily Allen released West End Girl, her first album since 2018’s Mercury Prize-nominated No Shame, to great acclaim. (The new album reached number 2 on the UK album charts; No Shame peaked at number 8.) The album is a voyeuristic meditation on the unraveling of Allen’s marriage to actor David Harbour, presenting a devastatingly vulnerable and transparent take on what led to the end of the relationship – most notably his acts of infidelity. This is decidedly heavy material for an artist who’s demonstrated a wicked sense of humor over the 20 years she’s been in the game – she’s released albums called It’s Not Me, It’s You and Sheezus – but on April 17th, in an intimate performance at Philadelphia’s Met Opera House, she managed to cover ground both serious and cheeky, much to the delight of the engaged crowd.
The Dallas Minor Trio, made up of three cellists, opened the evening with a set of instrumental takes, both bowed and plucked, on Allen’s back catalogue. (The name is a nod to “Dallas Major,” a tune from West End Girl.) On a large screen above the stage were displayed the lyrics to each of the songs, inviting the audience to sing along to classics like “Smile,” “Alfie,” and “Fuck You.” This juxtaposition of sacred – a string trio – and profane – the lyrics to “Fuck You” include 37 repetitions of the title – scratched fans’ itch for a set of tunes they’ve known for years and did so in a way that served as a warmup for a set of heavy, albeit highly danceable, music.
Soon after the string trio left the stage, the lights went down as the opening music to the title track of West End Girl began to play. The curtains were drawn, and Allen appeared in a single spotlight donning a Chanel suit. (Outside of the opening set, there were no live performers besides her.) She sang the tune as it’s recorded on the album, including presenting one side of the call she had with Harbour where he broke off the relationship. The lush, intimate setpieces felt at times both luxurious yet somehow depressing, elevated yet somehow sleazy. As she removed her suit jacket, the stage began to take on the appearance of a discotheque, leading into the frenetic and auto-tuned “Ruminating,” where Allen serially tore down sections of the curtain to reveal more of the stage.
As Allen gradually removed articles of clothing to reveal sheer undergarments, she sang directly of Harbour’s gaslighting in “Sleepwalking,” as well as how she learned of Harbour’s infidelities in songs like “Tennis” and “Madeline,” where a single spotlight highlighted a woman in the crowd who represented the title character as though the two were in direct conversation. (Allen does a mean American accent.) As the song wound down, she drank from a bottle of water in the refrigerator that was a part of the stage, also taking the first of what would be a handful of massive rips from a nicotine vape stashed there. The crew changed the stage set, and for the first time in the evening, the bulk of the crowd took to their feet as Allen began to sing “Pussy Palace,” another standout tune from an album that’s excellent from tip to tail. In the song, she appeared in what was supposed to represent her West Village apartment with Harbour, where she wonders aloud about how she wound up with a sex addict, wrapping herself in a dress made of bed sheets showing receipts of Harbour’s infidelities.
Allen began to unwind, smile, and laugh as the show went on. “Nonmonogamummy” included a collaboration with rapper Griff, whose face was on a screen during the entire tune, and featured the most active choreography of the night. Allen left the stage after another costume change and returned to an even more sparse stage set, performing “Dallas Major” as the crowd bopped along with her. The stage set continued to evolve, eventually featuring spiderwebs and generally offering scarier vibes, consistent with the emotion and sentiment of the underlying tunes. She closed the set with some of the more contemplative songs from the album: the somehow Aimee Mann-esque “Let You W/In,” and “Fruityloop,” where Allen quotes the title of her second album (It’s Not Me, It’s You) as she essentially tells Harbour to kiss off.
Allen will return to the States in the fall for an arena tour, presumably with a similar approach but on a grander scale, making this intimate, entirely choreographed evening of music that much more special.
