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Happy Birthday Charli XCX: Exploring Her Road To Brat Girl Summer Success As Singer Turns 32
After featuring on the Barbie soundtrack, Speed Drive, last year and declaring Brat Girl Summer with her new album Brat in 2024, the singer has hit a new pinnacle in her journey to fame.
Charlotte Aitchison, known as Charlie XCX, is on a high in her music career. Following the huge success of her Speed Drive, which was featured in the Barbie movie last year, she has dubbed 2024 the epoch of Brat Girl Summer from her new album named Brat, proving her to be the queen of pop. Here is an insight into Charli XCX’s popularity, her worth, and other interesting aspects of her career.
One of the best songs on Charli XCX’s album Brat is Girl, So Confusing. As is true for many songs, this art-pop tune is similar to a stream-of-consciousness that speaks about Charli’s shyness and embraces a love interest, seemingly Lorde, who is both emotionally unavailable and intimate at the same time. For years, critics have aligned the two singers and drawn parallels between them, including dressing styles and music, which has created rumors of rivalry between the two.
A successful transition that can easily place Charli in the category of a major pop music star has been her talent for putting her persona and the trends in the industry into her songs, and that has touched the hearts of many fans.
Charli XCX and Lorde: From fashion faux pas to friendly feuds
When Lorde released her first song, Royals, in 2010, it quickly enjoyed immense popularity and topped the Billboard’s chart. At the same time, another English musician released a collaboration with Icona Pop, I Love It, which has also gained popularity. Success followed both of them, but they were looked at as two identical people because they donned similar hairdos and clothes, including intended stage costumes. Sometimes they were mistaken for each other, even in television interviews.
Unlike Drake and Kendrick's Lamar beef, Charli and Lorde did not take a very direct and obvious approach to their beef. By 2024, Lorde, 26 and Ellie Goulding, 28, seem to have left the past behind them, with the two artists growing into their careers and thus providing a remix of Girl, So Confusing, which fans believed was a song about Lorde.
This reunion is almost as interesting as the one between Taylor Swift and Katy Perry when they resolved their beef and Perry supported Swift during the latter’s Eras Tour.
As Charli XCX keeps on doing great with her seventh studio album as well as becoming the face of and setting trends for TikTok, let’s know more about her musical career, her net worth and much more.
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How Charli's childhood dreams turned into chart-topping hits
Charli XCX, whose real name is Charlotte Aitken, was born in Cambridge, UK, and since childhood, she has dreamed of becoming a pop star. The Spice Girls were her favorites; she was enamoured by them and their revolutionary style of pop and the interactions within the group. Another female artist to whom she credits her musical formation was Britney Spears, who she noted for her strength and great hits.
These legends paved the way for Charli XCX to stake her claim in the music industry with such racy and audacious careers. Her first successful single, I Love It ft. Icona Pop and Boom Clap, released in 2014, brought her into the limelight of the pop scene and paved her further journey.
From raves to charts: Charli XCX's journey from grime to Pop
The story of Charli XCX gaining recognition as a grime artist and transitioning to a pop star is as interesting as the songs they create. She initially released her first album, True Romance, in 2013, but her music career was not kick-started at this time. Muse began her career at the cute age of 14 and started uploading her tracks on the Myspace platform and almost within no time, her music interested people from London’s underground music scene. She danced and sang in underground rave parties; she joined Asylum Records in 2010. Today, her music is a mix of her past, the independent avant-garde in her young adulthood, and her newfound fame.
In an interview with The Guardian, Charli opened up about her identity, how she felt being both Indian and English and how this influenced her decisions and work.
Charli’s songwriting abilities are not only seen in her songs or personal discography. She has written songs for Selena Gomez (Same Old Love), Camila Cabello, and Shawn Mendes (Señorita), among others. Her first big hit was Fancy with Iggy Azalea, which became a hit and brought both artists to a brand new level of recognition, granting Charli her first Grammy nominations for Record of the Year and Best Pop Duo/Group Performance.
In the past years, Charli has experimented with a great number of themes and musical genres. In particular, there is one that appeared with the album Charli, which is her third album, where she addressed emotions that she felt. Still, with her latest album, dubbed Brat, she goes a notch higher and virtually asserts herself as the Brat girl summer.
All about the Brat girl summer trend
Charli XCX’s latest cultural phenomenon is the Brat girl summer fashion brought by her album Brat, featuring unique green cover art The songs in the album, including 360 and Club classics, not only blasted music charts but also influenced fashion during the summer season. The deep green hue used in the artwork of this album has contributed towards what will be known as the brat green trend in fashion, which breaks away from traditional pop cultures. Charli deliberately selected this unusual hue to provoke people’s curiosity and draw attention to the acceptance of quirks.
It even has a quirky list of activities that people have posted on TikTok under the hashtag Brat Girl Summer. People have started doing some mischievous things like sleeping in makeup, making TikToks at random, getting tattoos at random, and even wearing sunglasses at night or indoors.
Charli’s fashion influence has also been incorporated into her music videos. For example, the 360 music video includes models Julia Fox, Gabbriette Bechtel, and Chloë Sevigny in revealing outfits that have only heightened this trend.
Brat is also a commercial success; it peaked at No. 3 on the US Billboard 200 and charted well in the UK. While people expected Charli XCX to dominate the UK charts with this album, Taylor Swift launched her new album, and Charli XCX was left in her shadow, which led fans to question how this may affect her chart position.
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Chart wars & drama: Charli XCX's Brat vs. Taylor Swift's Tortured Poets, music feud unfolds
The conflict between the gloomy album Brat by Charli XCX and the torturous lyrics of The Tortured Poets Department of Taylor Swift shows an interesting phenomenon within the new music business. Taylor Swift’s album, which dropped on April 19, 2024, remains to be the most popular on the billboard charts and has overshadowed all other competitors, including Bella Eilish. Swift’s approach, which entails coming up with several versions of her album, has been seen by some as an effort aimed at trying to stay on a chart.
However, Brat, which was released by Charli XCX, also garnered a similar response when it was released but the limelight was shifted in the UK charts to Swift. Random fans accused Taylor Swift of trying to keep Charli XCX’s album, Brat, from charting at No. 1 in the UK because the same week, Taylor released a digital version of The Tortured Poets Department in the UK only.
The relations are more tense because there is gossip hinting at Charli signing Sympathy from Brat as containing lyrics addressed to Swift like, "I don’t want to see her backstage at my boyfriend's show" and "It is among the most quoted teenage drama lines within the target group. Cross X fingers behind my back." For some people, the lyrics like “And if, by chance, we find a lover in another man, then I will know her name when your name is producers like Midas” or “I hope they break up quick” refer to her short relationship with Matty Healy.
However, to the fans’ demand for controversies, Charli XCX has been trying to avoid confrontation with her counterpart. As recently as a show in Sao Paulo, she is said to have hushed the crowd, chanting, ‘Taylor is dead!’ Such a stand of Charli seems to be aimed at avoiding any potential competition with their previous collaborator, especially when she was part of the opening act for Taylor Swift’s Reputation tour.
This juxtaposition gives insight into the dynamics of chart competition and conflicts that are quintessential components of the music industry while also illustrating the public as well as private struggle.
From Brat Queen to $10M diva: Charli XCX's net worth
Charli XCX’s net worth, which stands at about $10 million as of 2024, mainly comes from her music career. This includes money from album sales and her tours. With the success of her latest album, Brat, her net worth is likely to increase even more this year.
But Charli isn’t just about music. She’s also been involved in film and TV. She did voice work for Major Lazer, where she voiced Lady Vanessa Rothchild and for The Angry Birds movie, where she voiced Willow.
Additionally, she appeared as herself in the Gossip Girl reboot on HBO Max, although it’s not clear how much she was paid for this. Charli also released a documentary called Charli XCX: Alone Together, which documented her experience of making music during the pandemic.
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