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Lily Allen · S3 E2
The Sound
Ska, reggae, pop, and grime — how she built a genre of one
Two studios on two continents, early 2006: Future Cut building beats from reggae samples in south London while Greg Kurstin layers acoustic guitars over vintage keyboards in Los Angeles. Neither knows they are making the same album.
"Ghost Town" -- The Specials, official music video (1981). The song that proved you can build a UK number one from a reggae rhythm, a minor-key organ, and a lyric about economic despair. Twenty-five years before Alright, Still, The Specials drew the blueprint Lily Allen follows.
The DNA
Alright, Still does not sound like a single genre because it is not trying to. The album pulls from Jamaican ska, British music hall, American soul, and south London garage, stitched together by a voice that treats all of them as equally hers. Lily grew up hearing these things in the same room: Keith Allen played The Specials on car journeys, and the family record collection ran from Desmond Dekker to Ian Dury.
TAP TO REVEAL: What genre were Future Cut known for BEFORE making Alright, Still?
“I grew up with all these records in the house. Ska, reggae, punk, soul. I never thought of them as different genres. They were just the sound of home.”
— Lily Allen, interview with The Guardian, 2006 [paraphrased: VERIFY]
The Sound in Numbers
Back to the Start -- Lily Allen
From It's Not Me, It's You (2009), but thematically connected to this moment. "Back to the Start" is about wishing you could return to a simpler time, before fame complicated the picture. Greg Kurstin produces with the same warmth he brought to the Alright, Still sessions.
Which of these genres does Alright, Still NOT draw from?
The sound is built from south London and Los Angeles. But there is one more producer who shapes the album, and he works out of New York. Next: Mark Ronson hears Lily Allen's demos, flies her across the Atlantic, and adds the final piece to the puzzle.
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