REVIEW: Charli XCX releases sixth album 'BRAT', a push-pull collection of exposed vulnerability and reclamation of her past and ownership of her power: 'I'm your number one'.
Published 7 June 2024
Charli XCX has long been something of an enigma on the music scene. As an artist, much of her work has defined the foundation of pop music in the 21st century: getting her start on MySpace, creating a string of experimental, bedroom-pop songs that attracted a broad online following, and breaking through globally with a number of major international hits. Her unapologetic embracement of pop music and indelibly stamping it with a cool and edgy vibe played a pivotal part in the deserved positive reevaluation and appreciation of pop music that has occurred over the past decade.
Yet despite the influence she has had on the industry, and the critical acclaim that surrounds her, she has never become the type of recognised and feted superstar in the way many of her peers with the same level of success have achieved. Much of this can perhaps be attributed to a misunderstanding of her music - witness the flurry of attention on her last album, 2022’s CRASH, with it being hailed as her first proper pop album, with most either forgetting or not even aware of the pure pop music she already created over the previous 10 years.
BRAT sees a Charli XCX that is almost conflicted, both celebrating her achievements and her power whilst also showing heartbreaking vulnerability as she then questions those same achievements and behaviour. The irresistible first single ‘Von dutch’ is a brash, glitchy, confident reminder to everyone listening she is the shit and we are all just living in her world - 'It's okay to just admit that you're jealous of me…just confess it cause it's obvious / I'm your number one, I'm your number one.” It is a glorious song that showcases Charli at her absolute best. The second single ‘360’, which opens the album, reinforces this mindset from its very first line “Went my own way and I made it / I'm your favorite reference, baby,” before she reminds everyone just how influential she has been: ‘Internationally recognized / I set the tone, it's my design / And it's stuck in your mind / Legacy is undebated.”
Yet elsewhere in the album, the confidence falters. On ‘I might say something stupid’, a pared back electronic ballad where Charli’s heavily vocoded vocals add an extra poignancy, she steps back from the confidence of ‘Von dutch’ and ‘360’. “I look perfect for the background…I’m famous but not quite…I don’t know if I belong here anymore,” she sings.
The frenetic, almost anguished beats of ‘Sympathy Is A Knife’ explores Charli’s anxieties ‘Don’t know if it’s real or if I’m spiralling / One voice tells me that they laugh’, while on ‘Rewind’ she sings ‘sometimes I just want to rewind / I’d go back in time to when I wasn’t insecure’.
‘Girl, so confusing’ is an album standout with its broody, heavy verses contrasting with a more poppy, upbeat chorus. On the surface it is a song about feeling confused and unsure about an unclassified relationship, but has a subtle undercurrent of the way the media and the public like to treat female artists. “You might still want to see me falling over and failing…it’s so confusing sometimes to be a girl.”
Sonically, Brat is an amalgamation of Charli XCX past and future. There are definite throwbacks to her early, experimental, uncluttered yet slightly chaotic electronic days on tracks like ‘I think about it all the time’ and ‘Mean girls’, and the heavy use of vocal filters throughout the album also brings to mind young Charli XCX. But there is also a broad palette of sounds you probably won’t instantly associate with Charli. ‘Everything is romantic’ combines classical strings and wind instruments with talk-rap vocals and hip-hop beats, while the heady ‘B2b’ transports you to a late 1970s-early 1980s nightclub with its funky, disco infused feel and disjointed structure.
There is also moments of pure pop bliss. ‘Talk talk’ is all swirling synths, sweet melodies and Charli’s voice soaring into her upper register. ‘Apple’ is arguably the album’s highlight, with a breezy beat that hurtles along without seemingly pausing once for breath, sweeping you on its unstoppable path until it descends into a largely instrumental section with a repetitive vocal hook before it ends far too soon.
‘So I’ is the album’s one true outlier, a heartfelt tribute to Sophie, the producer and songwriter Charli has previously collaborated with, who died in 2021. An electronic ballad that swells and subsides, it’s minimal use of obvious vocal filters showcases just what a strong emotive voice Charli possesses.
BRAT is Charli XCX at her very best. It is an album that explore multiple facets of who she is as a person as well as an artist, and brings in a variety of sounds that is almost like a roll call of her greatest moments in her close to her 20 year career. The sound of a true musical visionary, maybe this is exactly why Chari XCX remains something of an enigma - ‘famous, but not quite’. Perhaps the pressure and exposure of being a megastar would never allow this kind of left of centre, familiar but twisted, intoxicatingly brilliant music to shine. She may be a BRAT, but she has also created one of the greatest albums of 2024.
BRAT is out now via Warner Music. You can buy and stream here.
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