Live: Lily Allen at NYC's Bowery Ballroom

Being at a Lily Allen show is like attending the best slumber party ever at the house of that cool naughty girl in school whose parents always stock the liquor cabinet then leave town for the weekend. You get loaded on schnapps, try on party dresses and mom’s jewelry, say lots of bad words really loudly, boytalk, and giggle. If you are a girl, then, the British pop stars performance last night at New York City’s Bowery Ballroom felt very familiar. If you’re a boy, well, now you know what it’s like to be a sixteen-year-old girl. Fun, right?

Allen took the stage wearing a smashing prom dress, scary high Christian Louboutin platforms, plastic cup filled to the brim with white wine in one gloved hand. She took us through a totally engaging, campy set filled mostly with songs off her new album It’s Not Me, It’s You, which came out yesterday. Even though Allen’s new subtly titled song “Fuck You” is an eviscerating take down of America’s former president, it’s still more than he deserves to hold this woman’s attention for three minutes and forty-three seconds. Whether she’s complaining about finding the perfect guy then realizing he sucks in bed (“Not Fair”) or confronting the fact that pushing thirty party girls are depressing (“22”) Allen’s new stuff sounds like her old stuff in all the right ways - it’s witty, defiant, a little sad and wise.

Even though the crowd knew the words to all the new songs (“which means you motherfuckers have been downloading it illegally” the singer mock-chastised) Allen still gave up the crowd-pleasing goods by playing “Smile.” As she cooed “I love you too” to the adoring throngs in the front of the stage, pulled down her skirt with a faux demure ‘scuse me’ and swigged the last of her wine then launched into an encore version of Britney’s “Womanizer” it really felt like we were all going to meet her backstage later for a five-hundred person Twizzler-eating, “Pretty In Pink” watching session. Can we borrow pajamas, Lily?