Charli XCX - brat - album review

By Christina Sylvester.

Charli XCX’s sixth studio album "Brat" yoyos through the multifaceted emotions of girlhood, from bashfulness to vulnerability, to online feuds. She seems to talk about her own life, how she feels being in the spotlight, jealousy, being the life of the party and even grief. As we follow her train of thought through the album, it’s made even better by big-name music makers like Cirkut, George Daniel, El Guincho, Gesaffelstein, Hudson Mohawke, Finn Keane and A.G. Cook.

Every track on Brat has a totally different vibe. In her first song ‘360’, she jabs hard at the lifecycle of influencer culture and references OG’s from past Twitter (X) feuds. Despite online feuds and the effects of social media being a hot topic, you can tell Charli is having fun with the lyrics in this, so much so, that it’s both affirmative and nonsensical:

“Yeah, 360 / When you’re in the mirror, do you like what you see? / When you’re in the mirror, you’re just looking at me / I’m everywhere, I’m so Julia”.

Those up to date with XCX’s friendships and lore can see the tongue in her cheek with lines like this, but it won’t completely alienate new listeners either. The track is a bop and encapsulates the essence of party music that Charli is very much known for. ‘360’ is a great starting point to the album, like the opening track to a movie, it's then a question of where things go from there…

Club Classics, while a little tongue in cheek with how the world drinks nostalgia by the bucket nowadays, got me drawn to a small yet very significant lyric, “I wanna dance to Sophie”. ‘Club Classics’ is dripping with that future pop sound, coupled with a tempo that really brought me back to Sophie’s ‘Inside Out” feat. Shygirl’. This isn’t too surprising, as Sophie was bound to be a heavy influence throughout the studio album. ‘Club Classics’ is a mind-melting electro-house track. It's brilliantly layered and club ready, but also a very casual listening experience. ‘Sympathy is a knife’ completely plays against this, as its instrumentally quite edgy and pointed. Charli’s spectrum of emotions is at its full breadth with this song - still upbeat and wavy - but heavily referencing feelings of jealousy towards an unknown person. “George. Says. I’m just paranoid” - perhaps referencing a real conversation with her current beau George of the 1975? “Don’t want to see her backstage at my boyfriend's show” would suggest that. ‘Sympathy’ is a track of many moving parts, fittingly, some things are happening without you realising.

What sets Brat apart from Charli’s other albums is her lack of fear regarding vocal experimentation. ‘I Might Say Something Stupid” takes this a step further, as the auto-tune makes this ballad of Charli’s interesting to digest. With a cadence similar to ‘Creep’ by Radiohead, it really slows the flow of the album down. The slight fluctuations during lyrics like “I don’t know if I belong here anymore…”, make those feelings of self doubt an audible presence and they really stand out, almost like the mirror she’s looking into is shaking in front of her. ‘Talk Talk’ replicates that minimalistic instrumental style to start with, it emphasises Charli, like an inner monologue. Charli has discussed in interview prior to brat about this track focusing on that sickly, sweet, wonderful feeling of the “talking stage”. The bass drops in almost as though it's the moment that stage becomes something more. But you can’t help but notice the similarities of a lot of lyrics in the middle of ‘Talk Talk’ could mirror either the steamy hot beginnings or bitter end of a relationship…

‘Von Dutch’ is where it gets really interesting. The lead single from brat dropped earlier this year, and while not outright said to be a diss on anyone, its very diss-adjacent. This track changes tone entirely, very much seeming to reference someone obsessed with her. Whether this is just ping-ponging themes back and forth with ‘Sympathy is a Knife’ or Charli just being, you know, a brat - is up for debate. One thing's for sure, it has one of the most hectic and original music videos of 2024. ‘Everything is Romantic’ has the openings of an old-school Disney movie, fused with Lady Gaga’s “Chromatica II”. The trilly instrumentals are like an ode to the small joys and beauty of life, while the bass and Charli’s vocals bounce the listener in and out of that joy like a panic attack. The idea that ”Everything is Romantic” as Charli says, seems kind of oxymoronic when you actually listen to the two oscillating experiences and emotions they convey. “Fall in love again and again” feels like a lyric someone would expect a woman in the music industry to drop, but it's autotuned. Is that to make it seem euphoric, or rather, fake? This might be a stretch, but Charli has taken shots at people for less. As the tied longest track on the album, it might have the most deeper reading in it outside of ‘Sympathy’ & ‘Von Dutch’.

When followed by her 8th track “Rewind”, there’s a sense that Charli is definitely clowning the expectations the music industry has of them. We can’t help but sense there’s a part of herself that yearns for life before success to enjoy these moments more. Evident in her line “Sometimes I just wanna rewind/I’d go back in time”, as well as talking about where she just prefers to eat. These aren’t grand, hyperbolic ideas like ‘Love Story’, its a human being just speaking their mind. That theme of the mind and the inner struggle is something that crops up a few times in the album, and we’ll touch on it again before we’re done. By comparison, ‘So I’ was an almost completely unexpected track. It stops the brat-ty energy in its tracks to reveal a vulnerable side that runs throughout the entire album. Initially, it gave Imogen Heap and Julia Michaels before soon becoming this powerful ballad that feels like the separated twin of SOPHIE's 2017 anthem ‘It's Okay to Cry’. A.G. Cook did an excellent job with this track, as the influences of Charli’s music seep through, but we are still clearly listening to the same person as the rest of the tracks on the album. ‘So I’ lights up the concept of how loss can take a part of you with them, ‘So I’’ potentially being how she deals with grief after losing Sophie in 2021. Charli seems to express some form of regret about not nurturing a closer personal relationship with the iconic hyperpop artist. The lyrics beautifully capture her thoughts: "You’d say, ‘Come on, stay for dinner’/I’d say, ‘No, I’m fine’/Now I really wished I’d stayed." It's a heartfelt reflection of Charli's longing for her friend.

Charli dives into the complicated world of personal relationships closer to home in ‘Girl, so confusing’. Though she never directly spills the tea about who her alt-pop counterpart might be. "They say we've got the same hair" is the only real clue we have  (Lorde perhaps? See the response to the ‘Von Dutch’ for a bi hint it might be). With ‘Apple’. Charli then goes from honest venting about her insecurities about success to a more introspective mood. This one ponders the influences of her generation on her personality, worrying about her future as a potential parent. ‘B2b’ is a bit of a brain tickler and in a good way. A few tracks on the album seem to be leading to this. It’s an example of “less is more”, with few lyrics it manages to touch on the pattern of emotions from anger to jealousy all over again, but in a new way.

“Back to, back to, back to, back to you / I don't wanna fall right back to us / Maybe you should run right back to her / I don't wanna go back”

That tail-off of “Back to” restarts the verse quickly, and later makes it apparent that this isn’t just to do with relationships. She references herself and perhaps past habits. Charli is discussing patterns and other self-struggles that simply don’t go away. Towards the end of the track, ”I don't wanna go back, back to” becomes a reaffirming statement, rather than a purely agonising one, with some anonymity and uncertainty thrown in. Alternatively, ‘Mean Girls' follows this as a track with razor-sharp precision, it's a real eye-opener into the intense relationship between idols and their super passionate fans (and a brief shout out to Lana Del Ray, if thats your thing)

"You say she's problematic / And the way you say / It's so fanatic / Think she already knows you're obsessed.  

It’s an addictive track with a bassline akin to “Sexy Bitch” by Akon and David Guetta but with A.G. Cook's unique production style here and adorable and whimsical piano melody that kicks in out of nowhere.

Rounding the album out is  ‘I Think About It All the Time’. In a heavily existential one, Charli explores the idea of being a mother. “Should I stop my birth control? / Cos my career feels so small / In the existential scheme of it all” is more of that half-inner monologue from Charli. The lyric “She’s a radiant mother and he’s a beautiful father” is where altered vocals resurface, a la Imogen Heap. The continued use of them is this specific style in brat seems to suggest there’s more to what she’s saying, similar to “Everything is Romantic”. This reflection on her career and family gives a sense of FOMO. It feels like a trade off where Charli isn’t sure which thing she’ll have missed out on in the end, as she notices the subjects of the track are still the same person in the end. It’s a reminder of the complexity of life and the normalcy to wonder “what if”...

The final track of the album, ‘365’, serves as some form of antithesis to the penultimate track. Where all the wondering and self doubt was, there is instead hustle, drive, and some bad bitch energy. This fast-paced remixed version of “360“ wraps up the album nicely and confirms a sense of content in her life - particularly as she’s “bumpin’ that” repeatedly as a “365 party girl”. The BPM is infectious as she talks about looking hot, partying in the club, snorting keys and being an all-around brat and proud. Safe to say, we’re here for it (minus the drugs). 9/10.