Charli XCX

"i don't feel like i connect to HER or feel there's ever much at stake" So glad you said this, lex. I gave it a lukewarm review, acknowledging it has a handful of great songs, for this reason and the blanket enthusiasm itt confused me. It's very basic - each song has one conceit (I like partying, I don't like rules, I am from London) which is reiterated efficiently without adding any new wrinkle. My daughters are obsessed with 1989 so I'm constantly reminded how many insights, twists and idiosyncratic details Taylor packs into her conceits. This seems cartoonish by comparison.

cartoonish is great!

Up to a point, sure, but I'm not going to lose my shit over it, especially when I feel there's more to her than that.

yeah charli xcx is really great at writing a catchy hook but i can't shake off the thought that she's not moving beyond being the "jessie j it's cool to like". i feel like there's a disconnect between her and her songwriting, like the amount of heavily-underlined character in her voice disguises its lack in the lyrics, which are mostly prefab signifiers - which actually might work with a more anonymous vocal (weirdly i seem to like the rita ora version of "doing it"...better???). she's tremendously talented and i don't dislike either of her albums but i feel like they're both, in different ways, dulled versions of what they could be

this whole thread and no one's mentioned the Marcus Schossow remix of Boom Clap yet (AFAICT)?

https://soundcloud.com/marcusschossow/charli-xcx-boom-clap-marcus-schossow-remix

feel like there's a disconnect between her and her songwriting, like the amount of heavily-underlined character in her voice disguises its lack in the lyrics, which are mostly prefab signifiers - which actually might work with a more anonymous vocal (weirdly i seem to like the rita ora version of "doing it"...better???).

This is why most of the album works for me: she's certainly NOT anonymous, so I hear no disconnect b/w her and the songwriting. It's like giving a charismatic actor a strong script and watching her go.

xpost sort of sounds like a trancey Knights of the Jaguar with Charli sped up on top of it? :/

I like the way it slows down halfway through then inches up through the tempos ever so slowly until it gets back up to top speed. But yeah very trancey.

I think the one-idea-per-song insight is probably mostly right, but I don't experience that as any kind of problem. Lots of the artists I love have only one idea per song. Some of them have only one idea per album, or one idea, period. If I want another idea, I switch to something else.

(Leveling this as a criticism feels to me a little like saying that Mondrian paintings don't have character development.)

She kind of reminds me of Gillette -- simple ideas put across with energy and personality.

a new blade stabilizer to maintain optimal blade spacing for maximum comfort too.

Well yeah

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Km3agvlyRmM

really hope this becomes huge

:D

yeah really feeling it, rita's inclusion is kind of pointless but it doesn't detract either

that sounds like a sheena easton song

I like this but I don't think it could be a hit in the US

Yeah, as much as I like this song (it's my favorite on the album), I think Boom Clap may have been her best shot at breaking into the US market this go-round.

rita ora is barely perceptible on this song

i think she's just there so it can be a uk hit lol

yeah i think this one's aimed at britishers esp. given that the album is (finally!) being released there soon too

rita ora is barely perceptible at the best of times tbh

is Rita even perceptibly bigger than Charli in the UK at that point? they seem roughly even in terms of singles and in terms of albums Rita hasn't had one out in two and a half years.

Rita is far far far far bigger

rita's had four #1 singles in the UK, she's also a judge on The Voice right now

welp, PC music finally found her i guess :/ http://www.wonderingsound.com/charli-xcx-doing-it-a-g-cook-remix-pc-music-rita-ora-stream/

lmaooooo

terrible remix anyway

i like AG cook but i'm not sure what the point of this is

wasn't she supposed to be working with them? i had hoped that she might get them out of their horrible habit of making grown women sound like babies, but, nope

That is capital D dreadful.

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

video:

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

This album is relentless!

love Hanging Around.

Charli knows the sick beat line is horrendous

Album finally came out in the UK last week. Despite containing two top ten hits it went at number 15 with 5,622 copies sold. Sad stuff. Shows that putting albums back and leaving a three month gap in between international release dates is really pointless.

If they bother with another single it has to be Need Ur Love. It's one of the catchiest songs of the last few years.

kinda surprised it sold so poorly in her home nation

U.S. first week sales were 28,907. i fail to understand why rita goddamn ora is so huge in the U.K. while charli has sales like that

I think a lot of people may have bought it on or import or just downloaded it when it came out in the US in early December. When an album gets put back four times people don't want to wait anymore. I'm waiting for a vinyl copy which has been put back too. It was supposed to be out this week but it's put back until next month. The whole campaign as been such a mess. It would have been bigger if it had come out just after Boom Clap but that was eight months ago.

love Hanging Around.

This is the one I've had on repeat recently. Great rip of "I Love Rock n Roll," with perfect teen-angst lyrics.

The current UK sales for True Romance are just 6,302 copies apparently.

She is too old for teen-angst ridden lyrics. That's why I couldn't support her this era, along with her poor quality, generic, rote tunes featured on Sucker. She was pandering and it shows all too clearly on this album.

these sales figures are fucking terrible!! holy shit!

she has more retweets in the last week than sales of her album

it's still a top 20 album though - i think really this says more about the number of people buying music generally than the album itself. That said, the label certainly stuffed things up. Should've been released worldwide in October 2014.

Maybe a cute video for standout "Famous" will help turn it around for this mess of a campaign-- oh.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5f5A4DnGtis

Yeah, how is this album getting no traction? A huge part of not just one but three songs of the summer, and then the album drops and ... crickets.

tbh it's really not that surprising, every single after "boom clap" did very little on the charts, with non-core fans

(which might be chicken-egg, but without any actual knowledge of what went on the label side what else is there to work with?)