Here's Why Charli XCX Is the Most Important Pop Star Living Today (and the One Who Will Save the Future)

For those of you keeping track at home, The Odyssey is nearly 2/3 of the way to $1 billion, after just two weeks in theaters, pulling in an additional $90 million in its second US weekend alone. Christopher Nolan’s epic remains a mega hit at the box office, but this past weekend their only competition was a pro shot of the Broadway musical Hadestown (and with only a 5-day-only theatrical release, that will be gone from theaters by the time you’re reading this). This upcoming weekend will be an interesting one to watch, however, as The Odyssey gets kicked out of IMAX theaters by Spider-Man: Brand New Day. Will Marvel’s latest string of flops hurt their most lucrative asset? Will The Odyssey buckle under the stress of a franchise-backed competitor? Or will they peacefully coexist while August presents no real blockbusters? Those questions remain unanswered.

While the weekend was a sleepy one on the new release front with most of the film/TV world’s eyes directed towards San Diego Comic Con (more on that later on), we were treated to a surprise music film from Charli XCX (one that you can actually log on Letterboxd), tied to her latest album release Music, Fashion, Film. The 30-minute-long genre-bending album had previously spawned four music videos, but Music, Fashion, Film (the film) is a 42-minute-long hybrid project that’s part-documentary and part-music video. The film doesn’t actually include the original music videos, but rather alternate visual projects backed by the tracks. If you haven’t listened to the album/watched the film, here’s your chance.

Awarded to THE standout figure of the week, recognizing exceptional talent across disciplines.

Okay, so is my headline a bit hyperbolic? Yes. Are you probably rolling your eyes? Also yes. But, do I think that Charli XCX really is the most important living pop star? Yes, because she is modeling the artistic process for us in a way that I think very few musicians (at least in pop music) are.

Several years ago I went to an Edward Hopper exhibit at The Whitney in New York, and while many of his great works were on display there, the museum also showed whole rooms full of sketches, partially executed paintings, and detritis from his daily life. (I was especially taken with a collection of ticket stubs he’d kept.) It reminded me that the artistic life is rarely about the finished product, even though that’s what most people see. The artistic life is about getting up every day and trying things, pushing yourself, and creating many experiments no one will ever see. It’s about being messy, wandering down roads that will lead to dead ends, and slowly, over the course of months or years, arriving at something special.

While I have no doubt that every major pop star has flash drives full of demos that never quite worked and notebooks full of lyrics they never used, we, as consumers, rarely get to peak into that space. Instead, pop stars, from control freaks like Beyonce and Taylor Swift to flops like Katy Perry and Lizzo, attempt to put forth complete, cohesive, gemstones of a product, hiding much of the artistic process. And obviously that’s not a new phenomenon, and that’s in many senses, how all art works, BUT what I think in the era of PR, AI, photoshop, autotune, plastic surgery, celebrity stylists, and legions of managers, agents, reps, and assistants, has changed, is that any trace of that artistic work has been scrubbed from the final product. When you see hand-carved furniture, the imperfections show the work. An IKEA desk is too perfect.

Let’s take simple red carpet photos as an example. Back in the 1990s, celebrities would grab an outfit they felt fit the occassion from their closet, throw it on, hop in a car to the premiere, and stand in front of the step-and-repeat. Their hair was a little bushy, their teeth were a little yellow, their dress had a few wrinkles. Today, there are whole teams designed to get every possible detail of a red carpet photo correct. The stylist, the assistant stylist, the make up artist, the hairstylist, the manicurist, the myriad PR reps hustling around, and that’s not to mention whole spas and doctors offices full or people who assisted with cosmetic surgeries. We see the sterling, almost unhuman finished product, but because there are no flaws, it’s impossible to spot the amount of work put into the photo unless you’ve stood beside a red carpet and watched the hullabaloo that goes into a single photo.

In many ways the life of a musician, especially a pop star, has become similar. Beyonce goes away into her studios and soundstages, concocting an album cylce that will be presented to the world as a finished product without error. Taylor Swift, a marketing guru in her own right, is writing her own narrative as a storyteller. But neither Beyonce nor Taylor Swift is really presenting a compelling picture of the daily life of the artist, and I think that’s something that we as society are missing.

Charli XCX, no matter what you think about her music, is demonstrating for the world that art is not about a perfect product, but about the process. She’d been plugging away in semi-obscurity for a decade before Brat skyrocketed her to success, so she learned to live the pop star life without overwhelming scrutiny. She experimented with different sounds, styles, and concepts, before striking gold with #bratsummer. And I think it would have been easy for her to hire 900 people to create another market-tested album cycle that, whether loved or hated by the critics, would have at least been perfectly executed.

Instead, Charli pivoted hard, taking microscopic acting roles in numerous films from interesting directors, letting one of her friends write a mockumentary for her to star in, and writing a movie soundtrack for the BDSM Wuthering Heights film. And while I personally enjoy pieces of her work in those films, her inexperience and weak spots are on full display. Her American accent in Gregg Araki’s I Want Your Sex is quite bad, The Moment feels a bit scruffy, and her Wuthering Heights album created the instant “I wanna die in this house” meme. These are Beyonce in Pink Panther-type choices, that most pop stars wouldn’t make out of fear, but Charli is intentionally swerving into artistic choices that she enjoys, knowing full well that some of them will be derided.

Music, Fashion, Film, her latest album and accompanying film, offer something similar. Some of the songs are excellent. Others don’t quite work. Pieces of the film are engaging. Others are dull. But in both she is openly discussing her artistic process and her vulnerabilities. She’s talking about experiementing in film because she loves it even though its not what is expected or what she’s necessarily good at.

In the modern age of corporate technology, MBAs, and FaceTune, capitalism beats us down with the idea that we must be perfect in order ot have meaning. If an apple is mishapen at the grocery store, it is thrown out. Humans are being replaced with robots who theoretically won’t ever make mistakes. Rarely are we given permission to be a little messy, and there is no art without mess.

Charli XCX opens Music, Fashion, Film with “Rock Music,” a song all about just hanging out with friends, fucking shit up, and seeing where the art leads. Then it pivots in “SS26,” which stares down the apocalyptic state of the world. The two songs juxtapose a set of ideas that I think Charli embodies. Living life is both not that deep, but also the deepest thing any of us ever get to do. In some ways, art can change the course of human history, but art is also just doing weird stuff because you feel like it.

As a writer, I really appreciate that Charli XCX is modeling an honest, earnest way to live creatively that is extremely self-important while also completely unpretentious at times. I think if we all weren’t so intent on perfecting things and were more focused on trying things we’re likely to be bad at, the world would be a much better place.

Awarded to the best-dressed individual of the week, either a real-life human or an on-screen character.

After Zara Larsson won her battle with Wikipedia to reset her photo, it seems that other celebrities are starting to wage war with the (often terrible) public domain photos that represent them online. I don’t know how exactly Zendaya did it, but she managed to replace her lead photo with one from the NYC red carpet for The Odyssey in which she is literally dressed like an angel (wings and all). There’s no out-mugging Zendaya, even on Wikipedia.

Awarded to the best use of the English language in the past 7 days.

While I’ve already spent plenty of time in this edition of The Report Card praising Charli XCX, I love the concept of her writing an entire song just to talk about how much she loves her platonic bestie/creative partner A.G. Cook (who I interviewed for Vanity Fair). We don’t have nearly enough songs about friendship, and I find this one quite tremendous on top of it being a banger.

Awarded to the individual(s) who deserve(s) an Oscar for their remarkable performance(s) on screen, large or small.

I’d never seen Jane Campion’s The Piano until its re-release last weekend, and I always find it funny to watch old Best Picture nominees, because sometimes they’ve aged like milk and other times, you’re completely bowled over by their beauty. The Piano is an example of the latter, and if you can see it on the big screen, I’d recommend it. The sequences detailing dragging the piano across the beach and through the woods are exhilarating to watch. Unfortunately, Jane Campion’s intro to the film did spoil me to the climax, BUT I was mostly just in awe of Holly Hunter and Anna Paquin in this film. I knew the two were nominated for Oscars, but I’d forgotten that they both very deservedly had WON the Oscars. Well worth a watch.

Awarded to the entity with the worst energy, most unwell aura, and bleakest constitution.

I was going to write something longer about all of the weird Comic Con announcements last week, whether that be Johnny Depp playing Ebenezer Scrooge (talk about ironic) or Ryan Gosling joining the MSU, but I probably spent too much time talking about Charli XCX (one of my favorite people to write about), and so I don’t have the space here to vent more about how studio executives seem to only be capable of the basic level of creativity which is X Famous Person + Y Famous Franchise = Z Amount of Money. The comic book world is RICH with creativity, and honestly plenty of compelling stories that could make great film adaptations, but rather than focus on all the creative box office triumphs this year, we’re getting more Marvel movies. (Obviously none of this applies to Black Panther 3. That will be perfect.)

If you’re going to engage with media in the upcoming week, this is what you should be engaging with.

I’m not exactly sure what the rollout for Sherman’s March is, as it’s a 3-hour-long documentary that is being rereleased for its 40th anniversary and seemingly isn’t available to stream, BUT if you’re in New York or spot this at your local indie, go see it. The director Ross McElwee is supposedly trying to make a documentary about Sherman’s march during the Civil War, but he ends up just filming his chaotic situationships with a half dozen women over the course of several years. You will learn next to nothing about Sherman, but you will be endlessly entertained by this 1980s fuckboy and his increasingly wacky love interests. I cannot stress enough what a delight this was to watch.

Sorry kids, but it’s time for the grown-ups to talk. If you’re a paying subscriber, feel free to read on for gossip, hot takes, and potentially controversial subject matter for your eyes only.