Charli xcx - brat - Album Review

For this album review, Charli xcx delivers her most acclaimed and introspective record to date, although not without raising revealing questions.
Best Songs: 'So i’, ‘Sympathy is a knife’, ‘Apple’, ‘I think about it all the time’, ‘Guess’
Worst Song: ‘360'
Transcript: www.spectrum-p...
Join my Patreon experiment: / spectrumpulse
Spectrum Pulse Social Media or to Support This Channel: linktr.ee/spec...
If you want to read the review in text, or check out any additional reviews I've done so far, go to www.spectrum-pu... for more. Otherwise, be sure to like and subscribe for more!
Thanks for watching Spectrum Pulse!
Charli xcx - brat - Album Review (hyperpop / electro-pop / EDM)
--
Spectrum Pulse is a music review / commentary channel, like colleagues Anthony Fantano of TheNeedleDrop, ARTV, Dead End Hip Hop, Rocked, Deep Cuts, Crash Thompson, Brad Taste, and plenty others, known for discussions of music, movies, art and culture.
Spectrum Pulse, music, review, 2024, album, album review, react, reaction, On The Pulse, Charli xcx, Charli xcx review, Charli xcx album review, Charli xcx reaction, Charli xcx brat, Charli xcx brat review, Charli xcx brat album review, Charli xcx brat reaction, brat, 360, Club classics, Sympathy is a knife, I might say something stupid, Talk talk, Von dutch, Everything is romantic, Rewind, So i, Girl so confusing, Apple, B2b, Mean girls, I think about it all the time, 365, Hyperpop, EDM
--
#SpectrumPulse #charlixcx #brat

[@sleepdeprivedpikachu7235]

lorde posted on her instagram story about this album being the only one that she’s ever presaved, and that’s certainly interesting and i wonder what it means for that album she’s due for next year, outside of that weird talking heads tribute song she did earlier tjis year

[@balldalt]

Glad to finally see an honest review. I haven't liked much of her music since her True Romance and Sucker albums. Nothing on this one is memorable to me. It's all filler/background music.

[@lorettahoffmann4226]

I’m only 5 minutes in and now I really wanna hear your thoughts on spring breakers.

[@odothedoll2738]

There’s an old post on his blog I remember it.

[@lorettahoffmann4226]

@@odothedoll2738 thank you so much for this. I will definitely check it out. I’m curious though did you like brat?

[@odothedoll2738]

@@lorettahoffmann4226 haven’t heard it, my album backlog is a mile long LMAO!

[@Jaden-zu9wc]

I actually listened to this album and really liked it! I like how unpredictable it could be at time (everything is romanatic) and the lycris empower me. I have to listen it more to see if still connect with it but for now i do!

[@Jaden-zu9wc]

I love spring breakers the song! Haven't seen the movie tho

[@skoop651]

If it's something someone unexperienced with music could make in a single day, it's not good

[@jacobdevine9031]

Charli was literally forged by the MySpace era.

[@tylerhackner9731]

I absolutely loved this album!

[@duke86fan]

wait everything is romantic samples vultures, i kinda haven't seen anyone even mention it.. it feels kinda like a reach since not even whosampled has sourced it

[@SpectrumPulse]

Annotated on genius, I went back to check the strings sample in the specific timestamps, and yeah, that's it. It's possible that it was just coincidental or sampled from the same spot, but I'd love for this to be proven wrong.

[@sleepdeprivedpikachu7235]

we can only hope

[@TrebleStarcrush]

@@SpectrumPulsehonestly it feels like you’re reaching. Probably was just a sample pack, plenty of 2000s acts at the time use them. Genius is open source so anyone could’ve heard it and assumed it was a direct sample. Kinda feels like you’re bitter that Kanye West is still in the mainstream, but given what’s happening in Palestine, I really don’t think people care as much right now.

[@SpectrumPulse]

The depressing thing is that I hoped so too, but I found the overlapping production credits. it's sadly true.

[@sleepdeprivedpikachu7235]

well that’s terrifying.

[@zkdr6278]

360 and Von Dutch are the only songs that got put on a playlist. The rest are underwhelming. The remixes are even more forgettable. I Might Say Something Stupid is good for a few listens. I like electroclash, hell the first two albums of 100 Gecs are some of my favorite, but Charli proves she still relies too heavily on repetition and basic lyricism. She also is really promoting drug use from her songs, and cigarette usage through her social media, which is pretty sleazy to say the least.

[@roastin4eva]

I’m personally really digging the new album largely because it is resonating with me at this moment in my life, I’ve been saying a need a “fuck you”-level confidence album to listen to. There’s certain moments on the album that felt a little off kilter at first that I don’t mind as much after a dozen listens. Maybe I’m buying into the hype but I do think it’s a fun album

[@klu5301]

Honestly the whole ‘brat’ takeover is so refreshing… a organic, surprise blockbuster album that so many can relate with. The Lana Del Rey line in Mean Girls is also such a serve (I’m a Lana fan and the whole song is so true). I’m happy for Charli and her well deserved success! 💚

[@TheNashNetwork]

I listened to this as someone who isn't as informed on her back catalog and I really didn't get the hype. It felt like kinda standard dance pop but without any unique edge besides a vague 2000s aesthetic.

[@zavs350]

I think you’ve missed a lot nuances the album offers, which I can’t really blame you for considering that it’s marketed and packaged to be as mediocre as it can be, but that’s precisely where the charm lies - especially when compared to her catalogue. What I find amazing in this project is its intentional irony, which almost makes it impervious to any form of criticism. It wants to be criticized, which is why I believe it’s extremely polarizing for some people (especially in this comment section) why it’s getting so much attention and acclaim. Professor Skye touched on so many layers of this quite masterfully, I highly recommend checking it out. To me, the title and the art speaks for itself, and that in itself is profound enough for an album.

[@SpectrumPulse]

It's almost like I deliberately highlighted that the intentional irony of the indie sleaze era of which this album calls back was thoroughly co-opted, or how irony doesn't challenge power structures the same way Gen X thought it did (the 2000s proved that in spades), and actually makes criticism just as applicable. Just because you do something 'ironically' doesn't mean it always sticks the landing, or means that it's brand new - from U2 in the 90s to Kesha's earliest albums, this isn't revolutionary.

[@zavs350]

@@SpectrumPulse but you’re willfully ignoring the fact that we’re not in the 2000s and the overall progression of her catalog. Isn’t what you’re doing simply false equivalence? That’s what I meant by you missing (its*) nuances because your opinion is simply packaged as “this is what they did and it did not work therefore this won’t either.” It’s obviously not impervious to any criticism in a literal sense-duh, nothing in this world is. But it does open an easy avenue to simply disregard such.

[@zavs350]

++ To add to this, in the first few moments of your review, the only points you had in referencing her catalog were sales, her issues with her label, and your clear preference for her preceding work (Crash, which had a different style) over her "experimental' stuff." Admittedly, such factors could have been tackled on how it influenced her artistry, or more specifically, Brat, but that wasn't how you approached it. You then glossed over a multitude of nuances you could've delved into by merely acknowledging the era she's calling back to... and simply leaving it at that. You completely ignored that the context we're in now is vastly different from the 2000s and even the 2010s, considering changes in the music scene, the internet, and the rise of music streaming, how women are portrayed and appreciated, fan wars, how it's so much easier now to criticize (artists'*) work. It's almost ironic, considering you yourself noted how she released this record immediately after finally achieving commercial success. On the context of it being "revolutionary," then sure, it's not. But how does that minimize the record itself? If anything, I'm willing to bet you disliked the record even before you listened to it. The review, quite honestly, shows it. EDIT and final comment: this isn't meant to invalidate your review or your opinion, I obviously can't do that since reviewing is what you do professionally. I'm simply explaining why I disagree with it. Sorry, please do know that I respect you regardless.

[@SpectrumPulse]

@@zavs350 okay, I'm going to be polite here, because I think there are levels of nuance that I think you're missing, the first being that the 2020s has shown a pretty nakedly obvious nostalgia for 90s/2000s pop culture, something that Charli herself has called back to on earlier songs like '1999' and you see plenty of times here. Not only are we seeing a nostalgia for the specific melodic tones and production (which I said has aged weirdly and described as to why), but it's echoed in Gen Z's reflexive embrace of the ironic framing that their Gen X parents did in the 90s and 2000s. The roots of the ironic framing are different, and I said that in the review and highlighted why there's an audience for it, it plays into a generational cycle of pop music, but some of us have seen this happen in pop discourse before. So let's keep going: if that 2000s nostalgia is in frame, it then makes sense as to why I referenced the label shift and why Charli xcx is now pondering going back to that 2000s era's shallow, plastic, semi-ironic dance music; she's only two years younger than me, so she's a millennial, but following off of CRASH selling so well, it makes complete business sense to play the 2000s nostalgia card that is in vogue among Gen Z, calling back to the era of when pop stars were allowed to be larger than life and messy and nakedly embrace those ironic contradictions and be heralded for it. That was common among the ironic disaffected Gen X of the 90s and 2000s - they had to sell out, might as well play the game and make bank and claim "ironic" if challenged for it - it's how you got 'so bad it's good' or 'guilty pleasures', there was a social context to it that's not new when Gen Z tries to rebrand it. Hell, poptimism originated in the mid-2000s, some of us were there for it and are seeing the patterns repeat themselves. Not always - Gen X ennui has a different timbre than Gen Z doomerism, like I said in the review - but like how millennials echo the boomers, these sociological patterns repeat themselves. You try to say that there's a number of nuances I glossed over, but that's because Charli and this album want to gloss over that era too - it feels anti-streaming in song construction with clashing tones, I don't indulge the stan war drama because even she seems to second-guess it continuously, and to keep it 100, how mainstream social media especially celebrity media treats women in the mid-2020s is spinning the backlash cycle back towards the 2000s, so the 'slight' conservative slant in framing some of this material also makes a degree of sense (that's what it was like at the time, I lived it). Most importantly, it wants to piss all over the earnest millennial 2010s pop songstress, both in its anti-aesthetic and anti-anthemic structures, which I also deliberately referenced - which also serves to dampen the more earnestly weird shit Charli did in the late 2010s, and is a deconstruction she can't even maintain when we get to 'So i', because ironic deflection of emotion just doesn't work when you lose a close friend. Keep in mind this is all descriptive of the material, not of my opinion, which appears to have flown past you - I acknowledge all of this, my critique was that it felt shallower than it should be given that she also knows the context of that era, and the time in which sonically she's recalling has aged inconsistently, and given how faithful the recreation is, it leads to mixed dividends; not all the hooks work as well, it happens, especially as Gen Z doomerism doesn't have the go-for-broke let's just fucking party vibes of the late 2000s. So to put it bluntly, you're categorically incorrect in saying 'oh you disliked it before you reviewed it', which is for the record an attempt to invalidate my review. Hope this cleared things up. :)

[@wholefoodstm4790]

I think you made him upset

[@sleepdeprivedpikachu7235]

well i guess i need to watch spring breakers now

[@fangirlonfire]

you should, its amazing. not harmony korinne's best, but still fantastic

[@camdenmred]

I heard 360 on the radio and I was like why is this song so mid? I found out she had a new album so I listened it was not really good but like I guess it had a few bops on it

[@wholefoodstm4790]

How do people not love the production and catchiness of it all? 360 is really fun and bratty in my opinion, would love to hear it on the radio !

[@wiggy009]

@@wholefoodstm4790I find the vocals and simplistic repetitive melodies annoying

[@Count_Deangeli]

Wow, Fantano gave it 10. Dude if u liked Crash and didn't like the previous two - you're way out there

[@riddypr]

But he DID like the previous two. He just didn't LOVE them.

[@wiggy009]

Who cares what Fantano thinks?

[@jacksonthompson8600]

I was going to disagree with you man, but you got me with that grade school line 🤣🤣🤣

[@TheMiels]

4:48 i dont see Spring Breakers as shallow hedonism, i see it as tedious and boring

[@gollumei]

I agree!

[@misfitsflorida1971]

If I never see another air quote again, I'm good. Best album in the last few years.

[@skoop651]

If it's something someone unexperienced with music could make in a single day, it's not good

[@moisesleeflores]

@@skoop651everyone has ideas but it takes the execution a deliberate choices to make certain sounds and charli excelled at making that soundscape. Just say you don’t enjoy the genre and move on.

[@RubberPhili]

Best Album in the last few years? Sounds like a very sad life.

[@wholefoodstm4790]

@@RubberPhili But it is lol

[@natesrates]

@@wholefoodstm4790hard glazing 😭😭

[@turboshazed7370]

I think the album is perfect.

[@BoboMusicalHobo]

10/10?! You must be a fan of Fantano..

[@daksh1673]

I can always depend on Mark for being the voice of reason. This album is good but not a masterpiece as people are making it out to be.

[@SheriffCheese]

94/100 on Metacritic. Melon gave this a 10/10. Masterpiece.

[@gollumei]

@@SheriffCheese Wtf is happening to the world. Everyone's just riding the hypetrain, spurring each other on, being brainwashed into listening to this crap. The train will inevitably run out of fuel in a few weeks.

[@aaronrinehart9018]

Or perhaps people can enjoy things that you don't enjoy :) hope this helps!

[@zavs350]

You’re acting like there’s a correct opinion on this, it’s fucking music for goodness’ sake. Highly recommend checking out Professor Skye’s review, he touches almost all layers the album has to offer masterfully.

[@zavs350]

@@gollumei you’re part of the problem, trust.

[@itsHavvik]

Thank god. I felt like a jaded old person seing Melon’s 10.

[@TheRareVideosXL]

Great album review.

[@JohnnyZBeatZ]

Good review please do a review of Yelawolf new album

[@Jkjkjkkj2001]

I definitely don’t think the album deserves the 95 it got on metacritic; it’s great but not the best of all time. After the plethora of those ultra positive reviews it’s nice to hear someone with a more muted review.

[@hpb714]

There's no song here called guess

[@pardonthemusic]

he's probably referring to the deluxe edition.

[@TheWolfGuardians]

Thats one of the laziest album covers ive seen in the last five minutes

[@royale9732]

Lazy? Not necessarily… Simple? Bold? Yes!

[@DashieNegan41]

It's reminded me of that horrible 30 Seconds to Mars album cover

[@gollumei]

@@royale9732 No it's definitely lazy.

[@gollumei]

And so is the album title. How can they not even be bothered to capitalise the B ? This whole album is just diabolical, from every perspective that you analyse it from, it's a brainwashing gimmick.

[@royale9732]

@@gollumei I really don’t think so! The album cover was inspired by UK rave posters from the era that she’s emulating sonically, and while all other pop girls often do some kind of photoshoot that show off their body, Charli consciously decided not to have her body on this cover (her first one to not feature her). She’s challenging the expectations that people have for female stars imo!

[@DashieNegan41]

It's mid

[@EllGee-hy2mz]

this is why no one takes you seriously

[@gollumei]

He explained his perspective quite respectfully and efficiently in my opinion. Besides for an album this shallow, overhyped, self-indulgent, and lacking in depth it's not going to take much time to discuss.

[@alexddragame]

this behavior is why no one likes stans

[@turboshazed7370]

​@@alexddragameI rate this album as perfect and would say EllGee sucks for being annoyiny

[@Missjunebugfreak]

I love this album immensely but respect Mark's opinion. You can disagree with his perspective without acting arrogant and snotty.

[@aaronrinehart9018]

Shallow? Like I'm all for people having opinions but that's your criticism of the album? I gotta ask if you actually listened to the lyrics

[@juliekeast6175]

I miss the "Boom Clap" Charli XCX tbh. Just don't care for the sound on "Brat" at all.

[@georgeandfriendsadventures5073]

I honestly like what she’s doing now. She seems way more comfortable in this sound and it’s way less safe and more experimental than her first 2 albums.

[@NaguibHSalam]

Big boomer energy ngl

[@gollumei]

​​​​​​@@georgeandfriendsadventures5073 There's no way in hell this is "experimental", it's bland, lazy, overhyped, genuinely dislikeable electropop. Absolutely diabolical. So undeserving of all this media hype when there are loads of other innovative electronic albums to be listened to. Anyone that thinks this is genuinely good club/rave/edm music needs to expand their taste. I personally preferred the more hyperpop style on her last 3 projects. This new album is just a media hype train brainwashing gimmick for immature kids that don't know what great electronic music is. The train will inevitably run out of fuel in a few weeks time.

[@georgeandfriendsadventures5073]

@@gollumei What she was doing before was lazy electropop. Look at a song like pink diamond or Click from her recent records. Those aren’t radio ready songs, they add in weird synths and vocal layers to switch it up and not make it a mainstream pop hit. This album is no different, songs like everything is romantic and 365 do the same stuff.

[@Kitas_Nissan_Driver]

It's the opposite for me personally I never enjoyed her first two albums ( I liked Boom Clap and Set Me Free though) I really prefer the hyperpop sounds but that's just me

[@sirum3n262]

I absolutely could not stand the production on a lot of this album, it sounds so cheap and “I’m quirky notice me” without any sort of substance or interesting ideas at the core! A few good to great tracks like Von Dutch, 365, B2B and Talk Talk but counteracted by some truly awful songs like 360, Club Classics and especially I Think About It All The Time, dear god that last one was insufferable…

[@gollumei]

Yeah I absolutely agree. It's concerning that millions of people are listening to this believing it's innovative electronic music. They put more effort into the marketing and media hype instead of the music itself. Sad to see.

[@ralphwiggum3463]

@@gollumei maybe you should get better sound equipment if you cant hear the amazing production coming through with the album.