Charli xcx has been everywhere since her “Brat” release in 2024. The electropop album took the world by storm, dominating the charts and our feeds for months. Long are the days of “Boom Clap” and the typical rinse and repeat pop formula she once used as that project solidified her as one of the most versatile pop-stars in the industry. Her concerts for the album were built like a minimalist underground club production with massive LED screens with stark lime-green visuals, aggressive strobe lighting, smoke effects, and fast-cut camera work that mirrors the album’s hyperpop aesthetic. It was its own unique rave that only Charli could pull off.
Her media presence continued to take off with producing the beautifully structured soundtrack for the “Wuthering Heights” film, releasing “The Moment,” a mockudocumentary of her tour, and with a role in Daniel Goldhaber’s “Faces of Death.” Now that dance floor music from her is dead, saying in a British Vogue interview that making another “Brat” would’ve felt “really hard, really sad”, many are asking what’s next for the renowned star. However, she did allude to a different “Brat” follow up that includes more guitars and less auto-tune vocals, adding that “We were doing our version of analogue, which is so silly and funny.”
Regardless, we got our answer of what to expect of a new Charli era with her newest venture into rock music with the simply titled track, “Rock Music”. But it’s not actually rock music.
Charli’s versatility continues on this latest track, but keep in mind that experimentation doesn’t always equate to quality music and this song is a prime example of that. Charli xcx’s “Rock Music” feels less like another bold reinvention and more like a concept stretched into a two-minute gimmick that doesn’t move the needle. Charli herself joked that it’s “not actually rock music” and that she won’t be releasing a rock album, but is anyone actually in the market for Charli xcx’s take on rock music aside from the fact that it is from Charli xcx?
The distorted guitars, blown-out vocals, and chaotic mixing clearly aim for abrasion, while Charli’s stretched vocals and synth-heavy production attempt to put her own spin on the genre, but experimentation alone doesn’t automatically make a song compelling, even if it’s a part of the song’s gimmick. Critics have praised the track’s “risk-taking” and self-awareness, yet the song often sounds more unfinished than intentionally raw. That is her intention, so maybe I’m missing the point, but to me it does not seem like a point worth anyone’s while.
Charli touted in British Vogue that she wanted to “bend the possibilities” of what rock could sound like from her perspective, adding: “It’s fun to flip the form. We know there’s gonna be people who are bothered by it.” I might be one of them.
“Brat,” its deluxe album, and her “Wuthering Heights” soundtrack sold me on the fact it was from the revolutionary pop artist and so did “Rock Music”, but it lost me almost immediately. The track borrows surface-level rock aesthetics, infusing fuzzy guitars, shouted hooks, mosh-pit imagery, but without capturing the energy, structure, or emotional payoff that make great rock hits. Instead, it feels trapped between satire and sincerity, unsure whether it wants listeners to laugh at her take on it or genuinely engage with it. Perhaps that’s the joke within it all that it is not a song, but a skit, a performance.
The biggest issue is that the experimentation doesn’t evolve into anything memorable. Songs like “Vroom Vroom” worked because the weirdness still served a strong hook and identity. “Rock Music,” by comparison, feels intentionally grating without enough payoff. Even among fans, reactions have been sharply divided, with many arguing the song is being overpraised simply because Charli released it and that we’re missing the objective of the track.
As a rock-inspired track, it falls short because it treats rock more like an aesthetic moodboard than a musical language. Charli attempts to tap into an edgy recreation of rock music in her vision, but it doesn’t move mountains for me. The guitars sound pasted onto a hyperpop skeleton, the vocals lack urgency, and the chorus never lands, which is what the genre thrives on. Instead of sounding rebellious or dangerous, it comes off performatively messy and a song more interested in provoking discourse than delivering an actual rock anthem. I suppose that works.
There’s nothing wrong with artists experimenting, and Charli deserves credit for refusing to repeat “Brat.” But “Rock Music” is a reminder that being unconventional isn’t the same thing as being good. Sometimes a genre experiment reveals new dimensions of an artist even if the intention is satire. Other times, it just sounds like a half-finished joke with distortion pedals attached. I hope whatever is next for her blows this out of the water.
Featured Photo: Charli XCX in “Rock Music” | YouTube
