In the title track of Lily Allen’s third album Sheezus, out next month, the controversial singer starts off griping about her media treatment, saying that no matter how “dumb” and “embarrassing” it may be, she’s “ready for all the comparisons.” And in another bit of brazen trolling, she proceeds to call out the industry’s biggest female names—Rihanna, Katy Perry, Beyoncé, Lorde, and Lady Gaga—in the chorus, offering either genuine praise or a backhanded compliment: “We’re all watching Gaga, lol a ha/ Dying for the art, so really she’s a martyr.” She then demands they “give her the crown, bitch.”
That alone should be enough to get feminists’ blood boiling, but it’s her bizarre tangent on menstruation that’ll really raise a few eyebrows:
“It makes me angry, I’m serious
But then again, I’m just about to get my period
Periods, we all get periods
Every month, yo, that’s what the theory is
It’s human nature, another cycle
Be nice to me, I’ll make you one of my disciples.”
Nice try, Lily, but you have a ways to go before you can equal Janet Jackson’s classic period lyric: “Cause my swag is serious/ Something heavy like a first day period.”