Relapse Lyrics
[Intro]
I need a drink
I need a Valium
You pushed this far
[Verse 1]
The ground is gone beneath me, you pulled the safety net
I moved across an ocean from my family, from my friends
The foundation is shattered, you've made such a f*cking mess
I tried to be your modern wife but the child in me protests
[Pre-Chorus]
I need a drink, I need a Valium
You pushed me this far and I just need to be numb
[Chorus]
If I relapse, I know I stand to lose it all
Can you bring me back when I'm climbing up the walls?
If I relapse, I know I stand to lose it all
Can you bring me back when I'm climbing, climbing up the walls?
[Post-Chorus]
I, I need a drink, a drink (The walls)
I, I need a drink (Climbing up thе walls)
I, I need a drink, a drink
I, I need a drink
[Verse 2]
The girls are looking at me to tеach them all about love
But I can't seem to hold my shit together long enough
[Pre-Chorus]
I need a drink, I need a Valium (Valium)
You pushed me this far and I just need to be numb
[Chorus]
If I relapse, I know I stand to lose it all
Can you bring me back when I'm climbing up the walls?
If I relapse, I know I stand to lose it all
Can you bring me back (Bring me back) when I'm climbing, climbing up the walls?
[Post-Chorus]
I, I need a drink, a drink
I, I need a drink
I, I need a drink, a drink
I, I need a drink
I need a, I need a, I need a, I need a
I need a, I need a, I need a, I need a
I, I need a drink, a drink
More than one
[Bridge]
If I relapse, I stand to lose it all
Bring me back, climbing up the walls
If I relapse, if I relapse
If I relapse
[Outro]
I, I need a drink, a drink
I, I need a drink
I, I need a drink, a drink
I, I need a drink
I, I need a drink, a drink
I, I need a drink
I, I need a drink, a drink
I, I need a drink
I need a drink
I need a valium
You pushed this far
________________ End ________________
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Relapse Song Meaning (Lily Allen)
Song Context & Background
On October 24, 2025, Lily Allen returned with her fifth studio album, "West End Girl", released via BMG UK. The album arrives after a seven-year hiatus and marks one of her most deeply personal and publicly raw creative chapters.
Amidst its 14 tracks, the song “Relapse” stands out for its claustrophobic honesty and emotional vulnerability. The lyrics speak of hitting a breaking point — the need for a drink, the need to numb out, the fear of losing everything — themes that resonate powerfully with Allen’s disclosed struggles in the period leading up to this album. In interviews she has said the record was written as a kind of autofiction: grounded in real events but shaped by narrative licence.
Lyrical and Emotional Analysis
From its opening lines — “I need a drink / I need a Valium / You pushed this far” — the song conveys a woman teetering on the edge, crushed by the weight of expectation, guilt, and the unresolved collapse of identity. The “you” in the lyrics functions as both antagonist and catalyst: the person who dismantled the speaker’s safety net and uprooted her life.
Verse 1 paints the geography of internal exile: moving oceans away from family and friends; a “foundation… shattered”; being cast in the role of the “modern wife,” while the inner child protests. The pre-chorus returns to numbing chemical escape: “I just need to be numb.” The repetition underscores the relentlessness of emotional fatigue.
The chorus frames the stakes: “If I relapse, I know I stand to lose it all / Can you bring me back when I’m climbing up the walls?” The relapse here is both literal (drink/Valium) and metaphorical (returning to destructive patterns). The walls signal confinement — the self-imposed jail of trauma, anxiety, and fractured trust. The repeated post-chorus — “I, I need a drink, a drink…” — turns the plea into an incantation: the breakdown in progress.
Verse 2 shifts perspective outward: the speaker is looked to as a teacher of love (“The girls are looking at me to teach them all about love”) yet she feels unable to hold herself together. It’s the contradiction of public persona versus private disintegration. The bridge’s repetition (“If I relapse… Bring me back…”) encapsulates the circularity of fear, dependency, and the hope of rescue.
What the Song Represents
"Relapse" is both a moment of crisis and a confession of awakening. Allen uses the language of dependency — drink, Valium — as metaphors for losing grip, but also as symbols of self-victimisation and surrender. Beneath the surface is a broader commentary: even someone who writes biting pop anthems about independence can grapple with powerlessness when the structures she trusted collapse.
Within the album’s arc of breakup, betrayal, and self-rebuilding, Relapse marks the centrepoint of the unravel — the moment when resilience cracks. For the audience, it offers both mirror and warning: that relapse, in whatever form, isn’t a dramatic event but a gradual slipping, a crisis of identity and safety.
For Allen herself, the song appears to represent the reckoning and the act of naming what she had previously toiled to hide. In interviews she has spoken of checking into a treatment facility and confronting how her sobriety and sense of self were unravelling.
Conclusion
In "Relapse", the personal becomes universal without losing its raw edges. Allen delivers no neat catharsis — instead she offers an open wound carried in song: the fear-laden admission that the one you trusted may be the one who unlocked your collapse. It’s a powerful middle-chapter in West End Girl, demanding that we see the fissures behind the polished façade. In doing so, Allen reaffirms her voice not just as a pop provocateur but as an emotional truth-teller for the messier chapters of life.
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FAQ Section
Who sung the song "Relapse" by Lily Allen?
The song "Relapse" was sung by Lily Allen.
Who wrote the song "Relapse" by Lily Allen?
Lily Allen, Kito, Oscar Scheller, Blue May & Violet Skies.
Who produced the song "Relapse" by Lily Allen?
Blue May, Kito & Oscar Scheller.
Music Video
Song Details
Artist: Lily Allen
Album: West End Girl
Genre: R&B, Pop
Language: English
Released: October 24, 2025
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