Are Lily Allen’s Songs About David Harbour Fiction? Fans React After Relationship Hint

Lily Allen’s new album about her ‘cheating’ ex-husband David Harbour packed a serious punch when it dropped last week with ‘brutal’ lyrics depicting their split.

But Lily, who has said that the album is based off both fact and fiction, now seems to be in a better place with her former partner, who was recently spotted with her kids.

While the album – which was created in 10 days last December – was originally lauded as the ultimate revenge record, Lily has now poured cold water on the hype.

During a recent interview, she insisted that she didn’t want to seek ‘revenge’ on her ex and didn’t feel like she was being ‘mean’ by divulging their private lives.

Lily dropped a huge hint that she has mended her relationship and insisted that her new music isn’t meant to be ‘cruel’.

The admission takes some of the heat out of her punchy tracks, which include discovering her ex cheating with a woman who she called ‘Madeleine’, and details sexual kinks and abandonment. 

During the time of the album launch, many fans insisted they would ‘hate’ to be her ex-husband, who has taken a serious verbal battering on the album.

However, it has now been questioned how much of the album is fictional, as relations between the former A-lister couple appear to be much friendlier.

Question marks over the validity of the lyrics have also come out, as a source told the Daily Mail last week that Lily is ‘no angel’ either. 

Lily herself seems to be backtracking on its accuracy, telling the Times over the weekend: ‘I don’t think I could say it’s all true — I have artistic licence…

‘But yes, there are definitely things I experienced within my relationship that have ended up on this album.’

She also confirmed that Madeline – who is the woman having an affair with her husband in a couple of the songs – is a concoction of real life people.

The Mail on Sunday reported the identity of ‘Madeline’ as costume designer Natalie Tippett.

The 34-year-old single mother, who lives in New Orleans, spoke to this newspaper from her home in the city’s historic Treme district to admit that she was the woman at the heart of Allen’s new album – and at the centre of her marriage break-up.

But blonde Ms Tippett was reluctant to hit back, or to turn her sex life into a public debate.

‘Of course I’ve heard the song,’ she said, rolling her eyes.

‘But I have a family and things to protect. I have a two-and-a-half-year-old daughter, and I understand this is going on. It’s a little bit scary for me.’

During a conversation with Interview magazine, Lily once again reiterated: ‘Some of it is based on truth and some of it is fantasy’.

In the same interview, Lily claimed she now feels ‘differently’ about their marriage breakdown.

Lily’s new insight on her former relationship came as her former partner was spotted with her children Ethel, 13, and Marnie, 12, at Epic Universe in Orlando, Florida, leading to speculation that there had been peace talks between the former couple.

When asked whether the new album is a ‘revenge tour’, Lily said: ‘It isn’t. I mean, I wrote this record in 10 days in December and I feel very differently about the whole situation now. We all go through breakups and it’s always f***ing brutal. 

‘But I don’t think it’s that often that you feel inclined to write about it while you’re in it.’ 

‘That’s what’s fun about this record; it’s viscerally like going through the motions. At the time, I was really trying to process things and that’s great in terms of the album, but I don’t feel confused or angry now. I don’t need revenge. 

‘It’s not a cruel album. I don’t feel like I’m being mean. It was just the feelings I was processing at the time.’

Alongside the interview, Lily posed for a selection of incredible snaps, including a steamy shot of her in the bath wearing a sheer white bra.

Elsewhere, she posed in a pair of frilly green pants, which she teamed with a black T-shirt, while a stylist tweaked the look.

Lily’s interview comes as David was said to have been seen with her daughters in a video believed to have been taken on Sunday.

It was an astonishing turn of events considering the same weekend he’s looking after her children, Lily released her fifth studio album, West End Girl, which publicly humiliates David and brands him a cheating ‘sex addict’. 

But this marked the first public sign of easing tension between the former couple, as it appeared David is still a part of her children’s lives despite their bitter break-up. 

Lily, who claimed the album is a mix of both fact and fiction, was previously asked by Vogue if David was planning on continuing his stepfather role to her kids. 

Lily replied ‘you’ll have to ask him’, but the outing suggested that David still has an active role in her daughters’ lives.

Looking every inch the doting stepdad, David was seen wearing a Super Mario t-shirt and a bucket hat, while walking at the Universal Orlando Resort in Orlando, Florida.

Lily has caused a huge stir with her no-holds-barred record West End Girl, which details the breakdown of her marriage to the Stranger Things star.

The fallout from their split is revealed in explicit and brutally honest lyrics, where Lily recalls discovering he had cheated on her by finding messages on his phone.

Lily references a mistress called Madeline, who is apparently a construct of several people and seemingly lies at the heart of the issue between her and David.

Commenting on reports of David being seen out with the children while Lily promotes her new music, some shared their confusion underneath the TikTok post.

One person wrote on: ‘So while she’s out there humiliating him, Harbour is on vacation with her kids? I can’t cope with this.’

Another said: ‘So he’s there with Lily’s children while she promotes an album.’

A third posted: ‘They are Lily’s children what the hell.’

Already at the top of the UK iTunes album charts, the songs have been streamed more than eight million times worldwide on Spotify, since it was released on Friday.

Their troubling relationship started off as a dream come true for the unlucky in love singer.

A year after they met, the pair wed in Las Vegas joined only by Ethel and Marnie and Lily shared pictures of her daughters celebrating by eating hamburgers outside the chapel with their new stepfather.

But, as she alleges in the ‘tell-all’ album, her landing a role in 2:22 A Ghost Story on the West End in 2021 cemented the beginning of the end, as he was unsupportive and asked for an open marriage, but eventually ‘broke the rules’ and cheated on her.

Now public enemy number one, the internet is awash with calls for David’s whereabouts, imagining him holed up in his Brooklyn apartment, ordering take-out to the Brooklyn townhouse they once shared [but are now selling] and cowering with shame.

David, who has no children of his own but grew close to Allen’s daughters over their four-year marriage, was reportedly not keeping a low profile and chatting to fans at the theme park as he accompanied the girls and a group of their friends.

Meanwhile, Lily has been celebrating the release of the album, recorded in Los Angeles, by giving various interviews across the Atlantic, discussing David and her daughters.

Lily and David are set to make a huge profit on their Brooklyn property, which they originally purchased for $3.3 million (£2.5m) in 2020.

David has amassed a $6 million fortune thanks to his role in the Netflix hit Stranger Things, while Lily is thought to be worth $4 million thanks to her music and podcast success and a series of stage and TV roles. 

The couple have documented the vast renovations they made to their home, and even invited Architectural Digest for a tour of the property.

Lily has relocated back to London following her split from husband David, but in a new interview admitted she wants to return to New York in the future.

According to The US Sun, Lily and David’s property only hit the market on Sunday, two days after her bombshell album was released. 

Documents obtained by the publication, show that Lily and David purchased the property under two separate trusts as co-owners, and have spent thousands on renovations to the home.

It’s listed as a ‘layered narrative of traditional English charm, modern Brooklyn sensibilities and rich Italian influence’.

Lily and David previously showed off their New York home after undergoing extensive renovations, including a tiger-print media room, their luxury kitchen inspired by The Godfather, their floral Parisian-inspired rooms and a walk-in wardrobe.

While the living room is filled with ‘detailed crown mouldings,’ it leads to a private garden that features a sauna and cold plunge at the owner’s disposal.

As well as two guest bedrooms on the third floor, the house also boasts a fully furnished basement with a gym storage space and a laundry room. 

A local admitted it’s been ‘quite some time’ since it seems anyone has lived in the property, telling the publication: ‘Every house on the street has Halloween decorations, but not Lily and David’s.’

Lily relocated to London she and David split last year, having discovered he’d been having a three-year affair. 

But the star has shared in a new interview she would like to return to New York in the future, telling The Sunday Times Culture Magazine: ‘My recovery is in New York and my health is a huge priority.’

The star added that she finds the support and therapy she gets to help with her struggles with alcohol and drug addiction are better in the US.

In P***y Palace, Lily sings how she arrives at an apartment in the West Village where her ex was living, but instead with greeted with ‘sex toys and lube’.

‘I found a shoebox full of handwritten letters,’ Allen sings in the second verse of the track: ‘From broken-hearted women wishing you could have been better. Sheets pulled off the bed, they’re strewn all on the floor. Long black hair, probably from the night before.’ 

Late last year, Lily was forced to sell her beloved home in The Cotswolds to pay a hefty tax bill, but has since bought a property in Notting Hill, where she grew up.

‘She’s a west London girl and is loving being back,’ a family friend told Daily Mail’s Richard Eden. ‘Her new place is just a ten-minute walk from her mum’s home and they are very close.’

Lily, who has two children with her ex-husband Sam Cooper, sold her 17th-century home in Cranham, Gloucestershire, for £4.2 million in 2016 after being sued by an ex-tour manager for more than £100,000.

‘I had my house of dreams.’ she later reminisced. ‘I did it up so nice, it was my life project, the place where I was going to raise my children.’

She added: ‘I’m a firm believer in paying tax. But I got sued. I had to pay him off, with the money I’d put aside for my tax.

‘I tried to work out a deal with HMRC to pay them back in instalments, but they said no. It was absolutely soul-destroying, and a real lesson in life.’

The record comes after a turbulent time in Lily’s life following the breakdown of her marriage last December after she accused David of having multiple affairs including his three-year affair with a younger costume designer.

The Mail on Sunday has exclusively revealed the identity of ‘Madeline’ and spoke to her from her home in the US.

Lily’s fans have said the song is a modern-day equivalent of Beyonce’s ‘Becky with the good hair,’ which featured on a song called Sorry, a cheating diss track from her 2016 album Lemonade.  

The lyrics see Lily appearing to suggest the couple had an open arrangement in regards to sex, as long as it was discrete, with paid strangers and not based on emotional connection.

She sings: ‘How long has it been going on? Is it just sex or is there emotion?/ He told me it would stay in hotel rooms, never be out in the open.

The chorus reads: ‘We had an arrangement/ Be discrete and don’t be blatant. There had to be payment/ It had to be with strangers/ But you’re not a stranger, Madeline.’

Speaking to The Times, Lily seemingly confirmed that ‘agreed-upon boundaries were not adhered to’ in her relationship with David, while addressing how apps had made cheating easier. 

She said: ‘There are usually agreed-upon boundaries in relationships. But whether those boundaries are adhered to or not is becoming a grey area all of a sudden. 

‘Dating apps make people disposable and that leads to the idea that if you are not happy, there’s so much more to choose from — right in your pocket.

Lily famously uncovered David’s infidelity when she discovered his profile on celebrity dating app, Raya, and ‘joined the dots’.

The pop star joined the app herself, pretending to be ‘looking for women’ – and allegedly found that her now ex-husband had already set up a dating profile.

Speaking to the publication, she detailed how she believed dating apps were making people ‘disposable’ and changing conventional ideas about monogamy.

Her split from David led Lily to check into a £8,000-a-week trauma treatment centre to focus on her mental health.

And she admitted that she has used her music as a way to work through the dark feelings she was having and to ‘lay my truth on the table’.