On the Rise: Amy Allen

“I’ve never really advocated for myself in the music industry before this past year and a half, or two years. Once I understood how to do it and I didn’t feel guilty about it, I was like ‘Oh, I’m riding a bike now, I got this’,” Amy Allen explains over a Zoom call. We’re discussing the meaning behind the songs on her new EP, AWW!, specifically her recent single, feminist anthem "A Woman’s World". In the video for the track, Allen climbs to the top of a monument dedicated to the late Ruth Bader Ginsburg, the first Jewish woman, and the second ever woman, to serve as a justice of the Supreme Court of the United States.

“Everybody has specific women in their life that they're like, ‘that woman is really changing the future’ or ‘that person is really changing the future for somebody like me’, and she's always been somebody that I've just had a profound respect for of what she's done for women's rights and standing up for women”, she says, explaining her decision behind honouring the late justice, describing her as “larger than life.” "A Woman’s World" is Allen’s way of paying homage to the women who have empowered her throughout her life, featuring a symbolic and literal pilgrimage to the monument.

Allen describes the track as “a turning point” in her song writing: “I felt very proud of that song. And it's something that I love to play live, because I think that it's nice as a woman to give that moment to other women in the audience where I see them.”

Allen grew up in Maine, U.S., went to school at Boston College, and then later, Berklee College of Music. From an early age, her parents encouraged her to explore music as a hobby, and she played in an all-girl rock band with her sister: “my middle sister was on the drums and I was on bass”, she says, describing it as her form of self-expression as a child. “I ended up getting a guitar at maybe age 10 and started writing songs. I was probably one of the quieter of the three daughters and [her parents] knew it was a really important outlet for me. It just became my go to thing that made me feel like a superpower I had.”

Growing up, she was immersed in the world of ‘90s female pop rock icons, a scene that has re-emerged in recent years – “I listened to Hole a lot when I was growing up. I really loved the female rockers. I’ve always liked the fabric of that music, it’s what I always come back to. I love seeing it come back right now.” Nowadays, Allen looks towards “great storytellers” for inspiration, and finds passion in “entering somebody else’s world and seeing it through their eyes.”

In the world of song writing, perspectives like Allen’s are few and far between. A report by USC Annenberg’s Inclusion Initiative, published in March 2021, found that from 2012 until 2020, only 12.6% of song writers were women, and of the 900 popular songs reviewed in the report, a huge 57.3% had no writing credits for female song writers. It’s a similar story in the UK: last year, PRS for Music found that only 18.4% of their membership was made up of women, and in 2019, the top 19 female songwriters in the UK generated 67% less revenue than the top 10 male song writers.

Allen is hopeful, however, that things will change soon: “It’s important to have more women writing and performing so that younger girls can be hearing that and really connecting with that and resonating with that, and then being inspired to do that themselves. It's really like a cyclical thing. So I feel a little bit sad that, you know, there's not more of that happening yet. Because we're in 2021.” Later, she adds, “I'm really excited to hear what the next generation of singer songwriters creates, and I want to do my part in making sure that they're able to.”

Allen’s work was acknowledged this year at the 66th Ivor Novello Awards, when she won PRS For Music Most Performed Work for "Adore You", the track she co-wrote with Harry Styles, Tyler Johnson and Kid Harpoon for Styles’ album, Fine Line.

Allen says it’s important to acknowledge song writers for their work, particularly as there is, what she describes as, a “stigma” surrounding the profession: “I do think acknowledgement is important. I think there's the stigma around songwriters, that we shouldn't really be rewarded, because we can make a living off of being in the background, and you don't have to put up with being the face of something.”

Much of Allen’s solo work looks at the experiences of women in today’s world. On ‘Difficult’, she pokes fun at a word women are all-too-familiar with being called (“I wish that I could love you / I'm difficult / Don't think that I can trust you/ I'm cynical / But I kinda want you to stay and change my mind”). I ask Allen if she can see her music becoming more political in the future, and she tells me how important she thinks it is to use your platform, if you have one: “It's something I'm really interested in exploring, because I think it's important and because I think having a message as an artist, when you have a platform to talk about what's important, is so significant.”

On "A Woman’s World", she tackles toxic masculinity in the lyrics “Boys wanna grow up / To be like their father / And then on their deathbeds / They call for their mother”. It’s a topic that Allen has connected with recently, and she tells me that she finds it frustrating that the culture of toxic masculinity stops so many men from opening up – “I see men in my family that I really wished this had been a conversation when they were younger. And it wasn’t, and they’re still great men, but they struggle with things just like everyone struggles with things.” She adds, “I’m really proud of our generation for starting this [conversation].”

Her previous songs have also discussed topics such as addiction. On the deeply personal "Heaven", Allen sings about how she felt watching people around her struggle with addiction. Whilst it was a cathartic experience for her, she wasn’t entirely sure if she would end up “crossing a line” – “The whole time I was writing, I was like, ‘I don’t know if I should be doing this’,” she explains.

But the track has also been important for fans who have been through similar experiences, and Allen calls this shared connection “beautiful” – “A lot of people write to me saying ‘this song happened at the most miraculous time for me’ or ‘I was going through the exact same thing’… it’s shocking how we all have people in our lives that we feel this way about.”

Today Allen releases the AWW! EP, which she describes during our call as “a collection of stories that are all kind of coming of age, little shorts stories”. It’s Allen’s chance to make music on her own terms, and create a space for her own solo artistry. Each song “has a little tiny snippet of a new understanding of [herself]”.

On the punchy rock cut "R.I.P.’, she criticises toxic environments, describing it as a song for anyone who has ever felt “undervalued in the workplace, or in a friendship or in a relationship”; on ‘Staircase’, she comes to terms with the guilt she feels being far away from her family, who are still based in Maine.

Eventually, Allen will release her debut album, for which she’s already written some songs, and will continue to work on it in the new year. When it comes to the art of making a fully formed album, she describes herself as “old school”: “I think that it’s so important to consume music that way. I think it’s like meditation.”