New albums: Lily Allen, Kanye West, The Presets and more

New music reviews fresh out of the box

LILY ALLEN
No Shame (Parlophone/Warner)
4.5 stars

BRITISH singer Lily Allen’s fourth album is not only her most personal to date, it’s the most brutally honest record from an A-list pop star in recent memory.

No Shame serves as a post-mortem to her marriage, a document of self-medicating with alcohol and some very public self-shaming over her parenting and infidelity.

Refreshingly Allen remains one of the few modern musicians who is as open in her music as she is in her interviews and social media. Authentic has become a hijacked buzz word, especially in a very beige world, but it’s also been Allen’s MO from day one.

No Shame is also a celebration of new love, lessons in female empowerment for her daughters (Cake) and a manual on surviving your life and identity imploding.

Opener Come On Then sets the scene of a fragile state of mind, not helped by Twitter trolls: “I’m a bad mother, I’m a bad wife, you saw it on the socials, you read it online”.

Musically it’s an update of the emotional synth work Marianne Faithful was doing on Modern English.

Trigger Bang, up there with the long-list of Allen’s finest moments, is another zero-effs-to-give acknowledgement of triggers in the singer’s night job: “it fuel my addictions hanging out in this whirlwind.”

The dub-tinged What You Waiting For? serves as an apology to her husband (“I turned a strong man weak, I’m hoping somehow he will forgive me”), followed by Your Choice which seems to dare him to leave — “Don’t be upset, I’ve always said that a man can’t own me...if you want to go that’s fine, that’s your choice not mine.”

As she’s done in the past (The Fear, Not Fair) Lost My Mind is a trojan horse pop tune with a hidden message inside - basically the post-mortem of a marriage breakdown. Higher taps into the same time frame, but you can almost literally hear Allen’s heart break through her resigned and bruised vocals.

The utterly devastating Everything To Feel Something is a musical IV line directly to Allen’s lowest point — it’s the new The Drugs Don’t Work. “Sex, alcohol and drugs, it’s a long way off amazing but I can’t ever see it changing,” she sings.

Family Man merges John Lennon and Massive Attack for a truly stunning ballad that takes a raw snapshot during the death throes of her relationship.

Three, written from the perspective of her daughter wondering why her mother isn’t home (“you say it’s work but I’m not sure...please don’t go, stay here with me, it’s not my fault, I’m only three”) is enough to make even the coldest heart gasp.

Apples is so unflinchingly honest you feel like you’re listening to her diary (“towards the end we were not even having sex, I felt like I was only good for writing the cheques”) before comparing her divorce to that of her parents. Ouch.

Yet her loss is our gain — Allen snaps out of the creative autopilot mode that sunk some of previous album, Sheezus.
The emotion in her voice and the precision and pain in her lyrics are the perfect antidote to an increasingly safe music world. No one writes lyrics like Allen, something she rarely gets credit for. Plus there’s tunes for days — pop music doesn’t have to numb or dumb it down and Allen’s worked with more edgy, underground producers than her previous records without being self-indulgent or self-sabotaging.

It’s not all grim — Party Lily is back on My One (admittedly her admission to infidelity, but still a banger) and Pushing Up Daisies is the sound of a healed heart — the happy ending the album needed. Welcome back. /CAMERON ADAMS
VERDICT Raw power

TRY THIS IF YOU LIKE... Marianne Faithful, Nick Cave

KANYE WEST
Ye (Universal)
3.5 stars

Kanye has long been a meta artist — commenting on the commentary. But this micro-album, made inWyoming, offers less insight into the cultural polymath’s recent political controversies than his family life and mental wellbeing — and with oft-misconstrued sardonic humour. Ye opens with the stark spoken word I Thought About Killing You. The pinnacle is the John Legend-blessed Ghost Town — a corrosively deconstructed Runaway. Ye is a strangely compulsive work from a man in flux. /CYCLONE WEHNER

TRY THIS IF YOU LIKE …Taylor Swift

THE BAMBOOS
Night Time People (Pacific Theatre/BMG)
3 stars

The Bamboos are indefatigable. Lance “funky fingers” Ferguson and his squad present us with their eighth album, a sun-soaked good time that suffers from a sugary aftertaste (Lit Up, Golden Ticket, Backfired) then rescues the situation with a late hip-hop injection, three different versions of Broken with rappers Teesy, J-Live then the best last, Urthboy. It’s a strange, weirdly appealing concept and credit to the band seeing this idea through to a logical, edgy conclusion./MIKEY CAHILL

TRY THIS IF YOU LIKE …Katalyst, Chic, ELO

THE PRESETS
Hi Viz (EMI)
4 stars

It’s a stroke of accidental genius.

The Presets became known as a band known for slamming disco rock (My People, Talk Like That) and melancholy house (This Boy’s In Love) then pulled the ripcord and freefell into sea-shanties and anti-EDM actual-songs on 2012’s thumb-biting Pacifica. The genius part?

Returning to their strong suit.

Their fans are hanging out for Hi Viz and, in 2018 tweet parlance, The Presets see you.

Knuckles is an odd, anxious, skittering Atari-bleeps opener, then Do What You Want pulls you on to the dancefloor and tears your belt off with its teeth. It’s like Rammstein and Skyhooks punching each other with kisses. Martini is a more straightforward 4/4 in-between club track, shades of Plump DJs’ Fabric-made Eargasm album.

It clicks into the vicious tech-house of Beethoven, Hamilton taking a sip on his glass of milk as he becomes A Clockwork Orange character. NB: they hold back a Mozart sample until the coda. Downtown Shutdown is the piece de resistance, this year’s Chameleon, replete with bright, local African voices.

It’s the jam that will forge peace between both Laurel/Yanny and North/South Korea.

Gear-shift, Alison Wonderland’s guest spot on Out Of Your Mind fires up the Pyro punk attitude. It singes as it slams — definite single. Tools Down is a tradie knock-off banger that features Jake Shears. He kills with his shrills.

Are You Here feat. DMA’s sees The Presets elicit an original, sweeping vocal take. Pretty impressive. 14U+14ME uses vocoder (make it stop) then things get nasty in the best possible way with Until the Dark closing all the doors of the club and cancelling your Uber. The Presets hold a lock-in. They know you don’t really wanna go home yet. /MIKEY CAHILL

TRY THIS IF YOU LIKE... the Chemical Brothers, Chromeo

FATHER JOHN MISTY
God’s Favorite Customer (Sub Pop)
4 stars

The sadder he gets, the gladder we get. Father John Misty is almost levitating, he can’t put a verse wrong because he’s a smart, sullen dude who is honing his craft. Hangout At the Gallows is Aimee Mann calming Supertramp down. Date Night sees him in form: “Do you wanna go to the park? I’ll get you ice-cream if you give me your card.” Like Arctic Monkeys’ recent work, it has a snarky, svelte sense of humour. Mr Tillman is a glimmer of hope (and he ain’t that sad). Don’t fight him. /MIKEY CAHILL

TRY THIS IF YOU LIKE.. Jeff Buckley, TISM

NICOLE MILLAR
Excuse Me (EMI)
3.5 stars

Sydney’s Nicole Millar broke out as a vocalist/writer with her guest turn on Peking Duk’s mega-hit High. Ironically, she’s dropping a debut album before them. Prefaced by 2016’s single Signals, Excuse Me is all Friday night bangers with lyrics fostering female freedom and empowerment. Though Millar leans towards sleek post-EDM, Gimme a Break evokes Rudimental’s drum ‘n’ bass and Sign Me Up (featuring rising US rapper Heno) is glitch-hop. Millar just needs a summer festival to perform at. /CYCLONE WEHNER

TRY THIS IF YOU LIKE...Dua Lipa, Rita Ora