Lily Allen rips off Take That

Lily Allen nearly recorded a duet with Take That on her new album.

The British group initially agreed to guest on the singer's latest LP, 'It's Not Me, It's You', but their manager quashed the plans – even after Sir Elton John personally called them to get them to agree.

Lily told NME magazine: "I love Take That so much that I ripped off one of their songs for my new album.

"I went to dinner and they were at the same restaurant. I went up and said, 'Hi! I've ripped off a song of yours.' I was drunk at the time.

"In retrospect I probably shouldn't have done that because I may have got away with it. Maybe not. Anyway they said, 'That's nice, Lily.' So I asked them to sing on it and they were like, 'Yes!' Then, Elton called them.

"He spoke to Gary Barlow and asked him to do it. But the manager said no."

Earlier this month, Lily revealed she had accidentally "ripped off" Take That song 'Shine' when working on tracks for her latest album with producer Greg Kurstin.

She said: "I didn't know when we wrote it. Greg just played the chords and I sang and we were like, 'That's great, really hooky.' Then when we played it back to someone, they pointed it out that it was, essentially, 'Shine'."

'It's Not Me, It's You' is released on February 9.