Critics adore Charli XCX’s new album ‘Brat’: Will this be her Grammy era?
Charli XCX released her sixth studio album on June 7. “Brat” comes just two years after “Crash” landed in March 2022. The British pop star has been around more than a decade now, but she hasn’t earned any Grammy noms as a lead artist yet, and she hasn’t won any hardware. Could this finally be her time to shine?
“Brat” has a sky-high MetaCritic score of 92 based on 17 reviews counted as of this writing — every single one of them classified as positive. Among those raving about the album is Poppie Platt (The Telegraph UK), who calls it “a courageous, candid reflection on how dreadful it can feel to constantly be the ‘cool girl,’ the one who laughs off failure, or pretends not to care what the critics think.” Adds Laura Snapes (The Guardian), “Charli’s unbarred feelings of insecurity, bitchiness and obsession are so fiercely well observed that they make tedious footnotes irrelevant … It’s hard to think of another pop star whose vision is so expansive and generous, not least in her willingness to risk being seen as mean in order to say something true. ”
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Paolo Ragusa (Consequence) says, “Charli XCX is very clearly having as much fun as possible, starting the party over and over again with in-your-face ragers and bad-bitch club tracks. But Charli is right to show that as shiny and futuristic the exterior is, she is not indestructible.” Meaghan Garvey (Pitchfork) calls “Brat” “imperious and cool, nuanced and vulnerable, and one of the best pop albums of the year.” And Brittany Spanos (Rolling Stone) states, “‘Brat’ seesaws between extremes from song to song, a hyperpop roller coaster of post-Saturn return, early-thirties anxieties, and It-girl bravado.”
But Charli XCX hasn’t quite gotten her It-girl moment of superstardom despite often hovering around it. She did score one megahit in 2014 as a featured artist on Iggy Azalea‘s “Fancy,” which earned her a Grammy nom for Record of the Year. Her last album “Crash” was her first to break into the top 10 on the Billboard 200. And her contribution to the 2023 “Barbie” soundtrack, “Speed Drive,” put her on the Billboard Hot 100 for the first time in nine years. But in a pop landscape crowded with young women from Taylor Swift to Olivia Rodrigo, she hasn’t managed to make noise at the Grammys in her own right.
“Brat” could be her moment, though, scoring a good 13 points higher on MetaCritic than “Crash” did. In fact, it’s by far the best score she has ever gotten from music journos. So after “Crash” and “Speed Drive” gave her a commercial shot in the arm, might this critical sensation finally help her stand out from her peers on the awards scene?
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