Charli XCX

No thread on her yet. Her two singles released this year ('stay away', 'nuclear seasons') got the 'best new track' feature on Pitchfork and TheSinglesJukebox rated the later with a 7.83 which is quite a high score by their standards. Also it seems she's been getting the love by british press for a few years now, but I can't confirm that firsthand.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KBxC5bRbruQ
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q1GNx2bwZa4

Is she named after a Star Trek episode?

From interview magazine http://www.interviewmagazine.com/music/brit-pop-girls#_ :

CHARLI XCX
FULL NAME: Charlotte Aitchison. “The XCX really stands for ‘kiss Charli kiss’ which is unbelievably crap.”

AGE: 17.

PROVENANCE: Hertfordshire.

SOUND: Pouty raps, fuzzy basslines.

INTERVIEW: How long have you been making music?
CHARLI XCX: I started writing my own things when I was about 8. I used to try to bully my friends into imitating the Spice Girls on the playground. Then I realized, Oh god, my career’s going nowhere, so I looked in the Yellow Pages and phoned up the first cheap studio that I found and started recording.
INTERVIEW: What’s your song “I Wanna Be Darth Vader” about?
CHARLI XCX: Well, last night on Britain’s Got Talent, there was this absolute twat dancing to
Michael Jackson in a Darth Vader suit, which put me off a bit, but I used to think Darth Vader was really sexy—the mask, the voice, the heavy breathing, and the way that his cape whooshes when he walks.
INTERVIEW: What’s your grand plan?
CHARLI XCX: Well, there are a huge amount of girls out at the minute and they’re all great, but I feel like I could take them all on. I like Lady Gaga’s music and I think her fashion is great, but I saw her on a chat show and I wanted to punch her in the face. I kind of like La Roux, but her voice sometimes really annoys me. That said, I recently noticed that I’ve been doing really high notes in my songs, and I’m like, Oh no, here it comes. I’m going to turn into La Roux. And I’ve just gotten a massively short haircut with a huge fringe. Next I’ll be going ginger.

God bless all these musicians before their PR agents get to them and they actually give fun interviews.
Great songs, by the way.

Whoops, meant to say "God bless all these youngish musicians while they're still giving fun interviews, before their PR agents get to them."

kinda confused by seeing people have their minds blown by her. she's ok i guess, need to hear way more though - i like what i've heard but i'm not fully convinced for some reason, seems a touch heavy-handed

Stay Away is definitely one of my favorites this year. Nuclear Seasons, not really.

Totally into "Nuclear Seasons" and I think I'm gonna go see her tomorrow at her first US show (!)

i love stay away. and valentine. haven't heard anything else other than nuclear seasons which a lot of people seem to like but i don't really get

the chorus in this is great http://soundcloud.com/charlixcx/youre-the-one/s-pU6Fs

Still waiting for something as good as Stay Away. Not even the Icona Pop song is close imo.

okay so this "super ultra" mixtape is just ridiculously great

It is!

cosign! this is probably the closest an album has come to approximating the feel of maxinquaye for me, sounds amazing late at night. rapping over "moments in love" is p much a direct route to my heart. it's a little messy, but the songs are really there. also i didn't realize she was only 20--she'll probably go for leaner production choices in the future.

Everything is consistently excellent. Also "Heatwave" is my jam.

It's almost as if... Someone made tumblr-pop that justified the adjectives and lurid colourscapes.

http://pitchfork.com/reviews/tracks/14932-various-artists-you-ha-ha-ha-lindstrm-remix/

Lindstrøm gives this shit a proper workout.

i really have no idea what to make of this album, like even whether i'm enjoying it or not

i feel like i'm on the brink of being completely YESSSSS THIS IS RESONATING DEEPLY WITH ME but i can't...quite...get...there and it's the kind of thing where if you're NOT on board emotionally it's kind of functionally useless

"you're the one" is a bit of a monster though

albeit i think i might like "you're the one" better if it didn't plunge shamelessly into its cheesy chorus?

the brooke candy verse on this is disappointingly terrible

have't heard the album but from the singles can attest that if you're on board emotionally they are the best ever

there's a vagueness that keeps me from being emotionally on board "you're the one" but that curving bass

really love the lingering the verses do on "you (ha ha ha)" too

Does she have her own "I Love It" on this? I am still curious to hear what she would have done with it instead of Icona Pop.

I'm into this newest single "what I like". she has a knack for cadence

streaming over @ pitchfork advance

This has very big Alisha's Attic vibes writ large all over it. It's a modern pop album that seems designed for people who grew up in the 90s, which is probably either really cute and endearing, or naff and silly, depending on your taste for talky-sung verses in the style of Siobhan Fahey when in Shakespeare's Sister.

Charli XCX herself seems very much a pop starlet for the twenty-something crowd, in the way she nonchalantly swears and sings about sexual encounters but it's all framed in this goth-pop cuteness with easy melodies and simple vivid imagery. I can see this album's relationship to 90's r&b being comparable to the way Anniemal took 80's disco and made it sound very pop but very chic, even though this is a lot more obviously dark and menacing.

aka the awful song with Brooke Candy made me nervous but I even don't mind that in the context of the album and You (Ha Ha Ha) is actually better than I remembered and the rest of it is great. The first three singles are still the best stuff here especially Nuclear Seasons but this is a pretty wonderful pop album.

as extravagant as charli's overload of stylistic reference points is, i don't think it's what's preventing this clicking for me - basically just don't think her songwriting is quite there yet. it's a bit overstuffed but the problem is less that and more her lack of a really distinct songwriting voice

or just, interesting words, or something

i think i'm the only person in the world that doesn't hate the brooke candy song. the second-to-last one "how can i" would be the dud if i had to pick one

You're not alone. Cloud Aura is one of her best. That said, True Romance is a let-down for me largely due to the production. My favorite track is What I Like, but even it has it's problems. Like why start of with a great intro that gets you all hyped up, only to never reference it anywhere else in the song? Still love it, but that's just one example of the many opportunities missed by this album. I expected it to be much more in the vein of Dance 4 U and Velvet Dreaming but the album's first half is like a 90's rehash of what Little Boots was doing with 80's pop.

I've been cool on her other singles but "What I Like" is marvelous.

this is awesome; the two-year-old songs thread in pretty seamlessly

weird but so far i prefer the album tracks to most of the singles (except "what i like" which wow). "like roses" and "take my hand" especially

black roses*

Really, really, really good record.

after seeing her live last week this album is finally seriously beginning to click for me

in a way i'm glad the singles never quite did it in isolation because i get to feel the rush of "YOU'RE JUST ELECTRIC BLUE" now instead

CUZ I CAN TASTE YOUR LIPS ON MY LIPS
YOUR KISSES TAKE ME OUT OF CONTROL
AND I CAN FEEL MY BLOOOOOOOOD
IT'S CRAWLING THROUGH MY VEEEEEEIIIIIIIINS

somewhere, shirley manson feels proud

brooke candy's rap on "cloud aura" is so so bad but the rest of it is so good

WHY YOU WANNA GO TO SLEEP
DON'T GO TO SLEEP
DON'T GO TO SLEEP
LET'S GO OUUUUUT

hmmm i gave this album a couple spins last week but i only actually liked about half of it (mostly the front half, but some later too), the rest just became this amorphous blur of whatever

it's taken me about a month and about...8 or 9 plays, i guess, to click

YOU'RE JUST ELECTRIC BLUUUUUUE is wonderful. all of this is wonderful.

except for brooke candy

Is "cloud aura" the same as on last year's mixtape?

yeah no changes as far as i can tell

"set me free" is ENORMOUS and shoulda been the lead-off single instead of "you"

I still don't get why "I Love It" didn't get the praise this is getting, I know it's noisy and brash but that's kinda the point?

This keeps getting better on repeated listens, it's not so much that it's a grower as

The photo of them sitting outside a cafe smoking, with Charli in sunglasses and her wedding dress, and with the lime bikes in the background, almost looks like a promo photo

promo for smoking

Should release a new remix album just called tar

I'm gonna go ahead and assume you mean the film

flopson otm, i am v charmed by the wedding photos. for once it looks fun, like a wedding should be!

xpost It can mean that, or it could mean a Visage concept album or etc

"The Damned Don't Brat"

"Spiteful Brat, Hateful Brat"

New song with John Cale (!) coming next week:
https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-news/charli-xcx-teases-song-house-john-cale-wuthering-heights-1235460891

More on Charli XCX reaching out to John Cale and the new song and video

https://pitchfork.com/news/charli-xcx-and-john-cale-share-new-song-for-emerald-fennells-wuthering-heights-watch-the-video/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xgp7wlBfASA

Excited to hear my 11-yr old's take on this:

"bruh" *eye roll*

Maybe Taylor will try to one-up her by bringing Mo Tucker onstage

I'm really happy True Romance Charli is still in there somewhere

The Taylor Swift diss is hilariously lame in its irrelevance when Charli is making late period Scott Walker tracks

this isn't much but it's a success. i hope we're getting a full album of this

would have been a good song for the Death Stranding II soundtrack

cale part >>> charli part

My 11 yr old said she liked it, she also said once Charli came in after a minute-and-a-half of Cale, "oh is the song starting now?"

https://bsky.app/profile/brokenbiros.bsky.social/post/3m5ggkvujyk2i

Maybe Taylor will try to one-up her by bringing Mo Tucker onstage

LOLLLL

I'm sure Doug Yule's available.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=upkEBCIZOZA

we're getting a proper album!

love the true romance flavours of the second song

it's basically one of the slower true romance tracks but with the production from her last decade of hyperpop (though on the more subtle side and with some subtle strings) - it was produced by easyfun and co-written by justin raisen so that all fits.

it's a weird choice of single, it'd be a fine enough album track but it's not a big statement but doesn't really sound like a potential hit either. i guess "house" was the statement, which sure it certainly works as that

but idk i found most of the brat singles to be a bit underwhelming and then they were amazing in context on the album

oh it makes sense that it's because it's the song in the trailer for the movie lol

maybe i'm wrong but to me I'm reading this moreso as a diversion of sorts, something similar to beyoncé's the gift (an album inspired by a film without actually being its official soundtrack), rather than a fully-fledged new album campaign

it sounds like it's going to be a proper charli album (compared to the gift which wasn't quite a proper beyonce album) but i don't know if it's going to get a full-on promo campaign

i hope we get at least a cover of "wuthering heights" for radio or something

This is big enough to get its own thread. I like this song a lot more than the first one.

Heathcliff
It's me
I'm Charli

I'm so GO-O-O-OAT
Let me in at your window

lol

lmao

i hope we get at least a cover of "wuthering heights" for radio or something

― ufo, Thursday, November 13, 2025 10:32 PM (yesterday) bookmarkflaglink

ok but there’s no way she can sing this song lol

that's part of the fun!

Maybe we get at least a John Cale cover of "Wuthering Heights."

I'm pretty surprised the last dinner party haven't covered that yet

I can't be the only person a little disappointed this wasn't an Erasure cover

This one's for all my mean girls

Talent agency Gersh has dropped Succession actor Dasha Nekrasova as a client following an interview she conducted with white nationalist Nick Fuentes on her podcast Red Scare.

Nekrasova has additionally been dropped from a previously announced role in actor Gabriel Basso’s directorial debut Iconoclast, THR has confirmed.

Nekrasova told Fuentes at the top of the more than two and a half hour podcast that “I’m such a fan, honestly.” They talked about Hasan Piker, vaccinations and Kanye West, among other topics.

what is the connection to Charli XCX?

oh god not this again

the nyc red scare social milieu is parallel, if not intersecting with, the selection of “it girls” in charli’s sphere

agree with J0rdan though, it’s not anything worth thinking much about

Mean Girls is specifically about Dasha, not just parallel to her scene

Time to own the things you promote

did charli say that or just the active fandom of which you are a part

https://www.thelineofbestfit.com/news/red-scares-dasha-nekrasova-confirms-charli-xcx-wrote-mean-girls-about-her

What fandom? The hating Nazis club?

is this reddit

Yes