By Olivia Best, JRN 101 Student
Neon green marketing. The apple dance. Charli xcx. The “365 party girl.” They became synonymous with the summer of 2024—deemed “brat summer” by fans new and old. Brat became a cultural phenomenon.
But after headlining Lollapalooza with the first performance of her latest album, Music, Fashion, Film, and officially starting the first leg of her tour, Charli xcx is making a completely new name for herself.
She doesn’t want to be seen as the party girl we once knew. She has matured, and this is her call to attention.
Music, Fashion, Film is full of high highs and low lows. The opening track, “Rock Music,” fills you with anticipation. It’s energetic, exciting, and sets the tone for what the album will sound like. It’s Charli telling us that she’s changing her sound. “Yeah we’re on to the next, I think the dance floor is dead” tells us that the brat chapter is over, and it’s time to move on.
On the other hand, track 3, “Card Declined” is one of the lows of the record. The lyrics feel tacky and out of touch. “I’ll buy some jewelry / a personality” and “I’ll buy a smile” are almost cringeworthy. They sound like lines taken from a cheesy 2000’s movie. Not only are the lyrics bleak, the overall melody is as well. It’s a rough, guitar-focused song, and her voice just doesn’t quite seem to match it.
There is a drastic change in tone from “Card Declined” into the next track, “Camera.” It’s a deeply sentimental track about Charli’s relationship with her career. Unlike on Brat, where she glorifies the celebrity life, “Camera” showcases Charli’s raw, and real feelings. Does she want to be a musician? Does she want to stay in the spotlight? It feels like more soul and care was put into the track than many of the others on the album.
Everyone can relate to that uneasy, unsure feeling of questioning your future. Charli sings , “but all I know is how it makes me feel,” explaining that she can sense what she’s feeling, but doesn’t quite know what to do about it or how to stop it. She then creates a resolution in the song, where she is sure of herself. She sings, “Yeah, I can finally be totally honest / I don’t feel embarrassed even if I suck.” Charli has escaped from any boundaries holding her music back. She is authentically herself.
“Wink Wink” is yet another strong suit of this record. Once again Charli sings about her intentional shift away from the persona she made for herself. “I’m not a bad girl anymore, I promise” she belts out on this track, and creates a whole new image of herself. She sings about what she used to be like and how she’s feeling now. The melody is poppy, upbeat, and tells us that she’s happy where she is now.
But once again, she quickly retreats back to singing about the fear in what her future may hold in “I’m Afraid.” This track feels out of place on this album. It’s more of a melancholy anthem, and it is vastly different to the overall sound of the other tracks. It does, however, give the listener more insight on her transition into this new era.
The finale, “No One Lasts Forever” features a three-minute monologue from legendary director David Cronenberg. He leaves an eerie lasting impression on the album with his words that repeat in the closing minute and a half of the record: “They are dead, they are gone, no one lasts forever.” This track is Charli’s ultimate release. She is not scared of what other people think of her new music, because everything comes to an end. This track questions mortality and ephemerality, which leaves listeners wondering what might come next for Charli.
While her new sound is certainly experimental, it’s a new era for Charli that is worth exploring.
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