Kate Nash is tired. It’s 9 p.m. and she’s on her first major U.S. tour, knitting a scarf in her hotel room in Atlanta and occasionally yawning. And for good reason — it’s been a busy couple of years. The 20 year-old English singer-songwriter wrote her first song and played her first live gig two years ago, then went from a spot in Lily Allen’s Myspace Top 8 to the top of the English charts with her debut album, Made of Bricks.

Nash’s songs could be compared superficially to Allen’s, as they both sing with a sharp wit and a pronounced British accent, but Nash’s music is a little more indie rock. You could also say she’s a less weird, more English Regina Spektor. “Foundations“, her hit in America, have a lot of British slang, words like “fit” for attractive and “trainers” for tennis shoes. That Britishness worried Nash before her U.S. tour.

“People made such big deals of me doing gigs, they were kind of like ‘Oh my God, you’re so English, people aren’t going to understand what you’re talking about,'” Nash said. “I got asked that so many times before I went to America, I was freaked out, and then when I get there everybody’s really welcoming and nice and encouraging.”

As for the return of the British accent in British music, Nash attributes it to pride.

“British kind of popular culture is becoming cooler again, people are being themselves.”

And she uses it well: the slang, accent, and her strong voice combine to make her a lot of fun to listen to. The songs, which she wrote alone or with producer Paul Epworth, help too — they’re sometimes piano-driven, sometimes lushly orchestrated, and very catchy.