British singer Lily Allen didn’t mince her words when talking with Esquire UK‘s February 2014 edition about her impression of Hollywood.
“I feel like when I was growing up and dreaming of being a pop star, it was the days of Britpop when things felt authentic and anarchic, and people were taking drugs and having a lot of fun and having sex with each other and it wasn’t fake, it was real,” said Lily, 28. “So excuse me if I found it a bit disappointing when I arrived and it was a bunch of sterile f**king Botoxed idiots that stank of desperation.”
Although this is the most blunt Lily’s been about her music industry peers, she alluded to her feelings in the newly released “Hard Out Here.”
In the satire, Lily mocked plastic surgery, pushy agents and flashy music videos — among other things: “I won’t be bragging about my cars or talking about my chains / don’t need to shake my a** for you, because I’ve got a brain.”
Despite her criticisms (and her critics), the mother-of-two said she couldn’t feel happier with her place in life.
“I feel very lucky. I couldn’t ask for much more really. And actually, I’m not really asking for much more. I’m not trying to take on the world here,” said Lily of the acclaim for her “much-anticipated comeback” in 2013. “I don’t want to be Rihanna. I want to sell some records, sell some tickets to my shows and live my life.”
Still, Lily admits she hasn’t always felt so content.
“I thought the people in that showbiz circle were my friends, but almost the second I got pregnant and I wasn’t able to go out and party, they were suddenly quite nasty,” said Lily, who had her first mainstream hit with “Smile” in 2006. “There’s a way that those people survive, and it’s not by being nice. The way they make themselves feel powerful is to ostracize other people.”
Lily’s likely also found strength through her personal tragedies, which included a miscarriage in 2008 and a stillbirth in 2010. She’s previously spoken about spending three weeks in a psychiatric clinic after the first loss.
“Actually, it was quite nice being in there,” she told Marie Claire in 2009. “No one could get to me; no one knew I was there.”
