WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:03.060 Okay, happy Monday. It is February 16th, 2026. 00:00:03.680 --> 00:00:06.559 And, you know, if you have been anywhere near 00:00:06.559 --> 00:00:10.939 a screen, a speaker, or, well, frankly, just 00:00:10.939 --> 00:00:12.720 civilization in general over the last few weeks, 00:00:12.820 --> 00:00:15.640 you know exactly who is dominating the cultural 00:00:15.640 --> 00:00:17.960 conversation right now. It would be genuinely 00:00:17.960 --> 00:00:20.420 difficult to miss her. I mean, she is absolutely 00:00:20.420 --> 00:00:22.780 everywhere. We are talking about the woman who, 00:00:22.879 --> 00:00:25.699 just a little over a week ago, finally walked 00:00:25.699 --> 00:00:29.440 away with big hardware. Two shiny new Grammys 00:00:29.440 --> 00:00:32.479 for Brat. Finally, yes. Best dance pop recording 00:00:32.479 --> 00:00:34.479 for Van Dutch. And of course, best dance electronic 00:00:34.479 --> 00:00:37.719 album. But honestly, the awards almost feel like 00:00:37.719 --> 00:00:39.659 a footnote to everything else that's happening 00:00:39.659 --> 00:00:42.009 in her orbit. Well, it's the convergence of everything, 00:00:42.130 --> 00:00:44.250 isn't it? You have the awards, sure. That's the 00:00:44.250 --> 00:00:46.509 industry validation. But then you also have the 00:00:46.509 --> 00:00:48.289 release of her film, The Moment, which dropped 00:00:48.289 --> 00:00:50.969 last month. Right. And on top of that, the news 00:00:50.969 --> 00:00:53.270 that has all the film buffs, you know, completely 00:00:53.270 --> 00:00:55.829 losing their minds. Yeah. She is currently scoring 00:00:55.829 --> 00:00:58.390 the Emerald Fennell adaptation of Weathering 00:00:58.390 --> 00:01:01.469 Heights. Which is such a flex. I mean, come on. 00:01:01.490 --> 00:01:04.209 From I Love It to Emily Bronte, it's a trajectory 00:01:04.209 --> 00:01:06.189 that really shouldn't make any sense. Not at 00:01:06.189 --> 00:01:08.409 all. But somehow, with her, it makes perfect 00:01:08.409 --> 00:01:11.099 sense. We are, of course, dedicating today's 00:01:11.099 --> 00:01:14.299 deep dive to the one and only Charlie XCX. The 00:01:14.299 --> 00:01:16.540 defining architect of the last decade of pop 00:01:16.540 --> 00:01:19.200 music. And I really don't use that title lightly. 00:01:19.500 --> 00:01:21.859 No, and that's the mission for today, right? 00:01:21.980 --> 00:01:25.120 We need to figure out how this specific person, 00:01:25.299 --> 00:01:27.659 this girl from Essex, who started out posting 00:01:27.659 --> 00:01:30.359 what she called terrible demos on MySpace and 00:01:30.359 --> 00:01:33.420 playing illegal warehouse raves while she was 00:01:33.420 --> 00:01:36.150 still in school, how did she manage to... basically 00:01:36.150 --> 00:01:39.290 hijacked the mainstream. How did she become the 00:01:39.290 --> 00:01:41.670 bridge between the weirdest, most aggressive 00:01:41.670 --> 00:01:44.769 underground sounds and the absolute center of 00:01:44.769 --> 00:01:47.269 global pop culture? It is the paradox of Charlie. 00:01:47.409 --> 00:01:50.109 It really is. She's this massive global superstar 00:01:50.109 --> 00:01:53.090 who operates with the mindset of a, you know, 00:01:53.090 --> 00:01:55.189 a niche underground artist. She's a hit maker 00:01:55.189 --> 00:01:57.430 who is famously kind of tamed to hate pop music. 00:01:57.549 --> 00:02:00.849 Exactly. And she's the party girl icon who is 00:02:00.849 --> 00:02:03.189 actually a notorious, relentless workaholic. 00:02:03.230 --> 00:02:04.950 It's all these contradictions. And as we sit 00:02:04.950 --> 00:02:07.390 here. in 2026, looking back at the last two years 00:02:07.390 --> 00:02:10.469 especially, that tension seems to be the fuel. 00:02:10.590 --> 00:02:12.830 You know, that battle between being commercially 00:02:12.830 --> 00:02:16.050 viable, selling out arenas, winning Grammys, 00:02:16.110 --> 00:02:18.830 and maintaining that weird experimental edge. 00:02:19.009 --> 00:02:20.590 That's it. That's the core of it. So we have 00:02:20.590 --> 00:02:22.590 a massive staff of sources today. We're going 00:02:22.590 --> 00:02:25.189 through all the biographical archives, the discography 00:02:25.189 --> 00:02:28.389 deep cuts, the brat era interviews, and of course 00:02:28.389 --> 00:02:30.490 all the breaking news about her shift into cinema. 00:02:30.789 --> 00:02:33.210 Let's start at the beginning. Because I think 00:02:33.210 --> 00:02:35.509 when people see Charlie XCX now, the fashion 00:02:35.509 --> 00:02:38.189 icon, the film producer, it's so easy to forget 00:02:38.189 --> 00:02:40.689 just how scrappy her origin story really is. 00:02:40.729 --> 00:02:42.610 This was not a Disney Channel pipeline situation. 00:02:42.969 --> 00:02:45.830 Oh, far from it. So let's go back to 1992. Charlotte 00:02:45.830 --> 00:02:48.490 Emma Aitchison is born in Cambridge. And her 00:02:48.490 --> 00:02:50.830 background is interesting right off the bat. 00:02:50.870 --> 00:02:53.189 Her dad, John, is Scottish and an entrepreneur. 00:02:53.530 --> 00:02:56.770 Her mom, Shamira, is Indian -Ugandan, a former 00:02:56.770 --> 00:02:58.770 nurse and flight attendant. And she grew up in 00:02:58.770 --> 00:03:01.620 Essex, Stard Hill specifically. Right. And while 00:03:01.620 --> 00:03:03.379 she was listening to the Spice Girls and Britney 00:03:03.379 --> 00:03:05.719 Spears, like basically every other kid in the 00:03:05.719 --> 00:03:08.500 late 90s and early 2000s, her reaction to it 00:03:08.500 --> 00:03:10.659 was different. She started writing songs when 00:03:10.659 --> 00:03:14.219 she was just 14. But here is the detail that 00:03:14.219 --> 00:03:16.590 I think defines her entire career. She didn't 00:03:16.590 --> 00:03:18.710 just write them in her bedroom and, you know, 00:03:18.710 --> 00:03:21.009 hope for the best. She treated herself like a 00:03:21.009 --> 00:03:22.969 business from day one. You're talking about the 00:03:22.969 --> 00:03:25.949 loan, right? The loan, yes. Oh, yeah. She convinced 00:03:25.949 --> 00:03:29.069 her parents to lend her money to record her first 00:03:29.069 --> 00:03:31.830 album. Which is just wild for a 14 -year -old. 00:03:31.870 --> 00:03:34.189 Most kids are asking for, I don't know, a new 00:03:34.189 --> 00:03:37.210 bike or a PlayStation. She's asking for seed 00:03:37.210 --> 00:03:40.050 capital. It just shows this level of belief or 00:03:40.050 --> 00:03:42.610 maybe delusion, which you kind of need to be 00:03:42.610 --> 00:03:45.090 a pop star. That is pretty rare. So she records 00:03:45.090 --> 00:03:47.650 this album, which she calls 14, and she starts 00:03:47.650 --> 00:03:51.009 posting the tracks on MySpace. The MySpace era, 00:03:51.169 --> 00:03:54.729 the golden age of terrible HTML and those autoplaying 00:03:54.729 --> 00:03:57.400 songs on your profile. It was the Wild West, 00:03:57.620 --> 00:04:00.800 but Charlie wasn't posting, like, polished teen 00:04:00.800 --> 00:04:03.280 pop. She was posting what she later described 00:04:03.280 --> 00:04:06.400 as gimmicky dance tracks and fucking terrible 00:04:06.400 --> 00:04:09.240 MySpace music. She's her own worst critic. Always. 00:04:09.379 --> 00:04:12.300 But, crucially, it caught the ear of a promoter 00:04:12.300 --> 00:04:15.319 in East London. And this guy was running illegal 00:04:15.319 --> 00:04:17.779 warehouse raves. This is the part of the story 00:04:17.779 --> 00:04:20.600 that always blows my mind. You have this schoolgirl 00:04:20.600 --> 00:04:24.160 from Hertfordshire. She is attending a fairly 00:04:24.160 --> 00:04:26.579 posh private school. She's getting good grades 00:04:26.579 --> 00:04:29.459 in art. And on the weekends, she's putting on 00:04:29.459 --> 00:04:32.139 these insane outfits and traveling to Hackney 00:04:32.139 --> 00:04:34.319 to perform at illegal raves. And her parents 00:04:34.319 --> 00:04:36.819 were driving her. That is the best part. I just 00:04:36.819 --> 00:04:39.279 have this image of her dad standing in the back 00:04:39.279 --> 00:04:42.079 of some grimy warehouse. you know, holding her 00:04:42.079 --> 00:04:44.120 coat while she's on stage screaming over these 00:04:44.120 --> 00:04:46.860 crazy electro beats. It speaks to the incredible 00:04:46.860 --> 00:04:49.560 support system she had for sure, but also just 00:04:49.560 --> 00:04:51.980 that contrast. She was living these two completely 00:04:51.980 --> 00:04:54.180 different lives. And she needed a name, right? 00:04:54.300 --> 00:04:57.019 So she was billed under her MSN messenger screen 00:04:57.019 --> 00:05:00.519 name. CharlieXCX. She literally just used her 00:05:00.519 --> 00:05:02.060 screen name because she didn't think to change 00:05:02.060 --> 00:05:03.899 it. She admitted later she had no idea it would 00:05:03.899 --> 00:05:05.980 stick forever. She just thought it was for, like, 00:05:06.019 --> 00:05:08.420 one flyer. I remember reading somewhere that 00:05:08.420 --> 00:05:11.839 people thought the XCX was some deep, edgy code, 00:05:11.959 --> 00:05:15.560 like X -rated content X or something. Yeah. Nope. 00:05:15.660 --> 00:05:19.060 It stood for Kiss Charlie Kiss. No way. Yeah. 00:05:19.180 --> 00:05:21.860 It was just a teenage girl sign -off. It's so 00:05:21.860 --> 00:05:25.420 aggressively mid -2000s. She kept it. She said 00:05:25.420 --> 00:05:27.839 recently that she decided to keep it so she wouldn't 00:05:27.839 --> 00:05:31.319 pull a prince and change her name to some unpronounceable 00:05:31.319 --> 00:05:33.500 symbol, which I think shows she understands the 00:05:33.500 --> 00:05:36.529 value of branding. Even back then. But it wasn't 00:05:36.529 --> 00:05:40.170 all just, you know, cool raves and supportive 00:05:40.170 --> 00:05:42.949 parents. There was a darker side to her school 00:05:42.949 --> 00:05:45.209 years that I think really informs the outsider 00:05:45.209 --> 00:05:47.629 status that she still holds on to. Absolutely. 00:05:47.649 --> 00:05:50.569 She has spoken pretty extensively about the bullying 00:05:50.569 --> 00:05:53.430 she faced. She was, in her own words, a half 00:05:53.430 --> 00:05:56.310 Indian girl with frizzy hair in a predominantly 00:05:56.310 --> 00:05:59.029 white environment in Bishop Startford. Yeah. 00:05:59.089 --> 00:06:01.709 She felt like she stuck out. She felt othered. 00:06:01.709 --> 00:06:03.389 And she said kids would chant horrible things 00:06:03.389 --> 00:06:05.589 at her on the bus. It was really quite traumatic. 00:06:05.629 --> 00:06:08.230 That feeling of being the weird girl never really 00:06:08.230 --> 00:06:10.629 leaves you, does it? Even when you become a global 00:06:10.629 --> 00:06:13.310 icon. I don't think it does. And I think. That 00:06:13.310 --> 00:06:15.629 friction, that feeling of wanting to be accepted 00:06:15.629 --> 00:06:17.689 but also kind of resenting the people who wouldn't 00:06:17.689 --> 00:06:20.470 accept you is the engine of so much of her music. 00:06:20.629 --> 00:06:22.870 So by 2010, she gets signed to Asylum Records. 00:06:23.290 --> 00:06:26.069 On paper, she's made it. She's 18. She has a 00:06:26.069 --> 00:06:29.089 major label deal. But she described herself during 00:06:29.089 --> 00:06:32.009 this period as completely lost. Totally lost. 00:06:32.470 --> 00:06:34.810 She gave that interview to The Guardian where 00:06:34.810 --> 00:06:37.290 she said she hated pop music at the time. Hated 00:06:37.290 --> 00:06:40.089 it. While assigned to a pop label. Right. She 00:06:40.089 --> 00:06:42.930 wanted to make bad rap music. She was completely 00:06:42.930 --> 00:06:45.689 obsessed with Uffy and that whole Ed Banger record 00:06:45.689 --> 00:06:48.389 sound coming out of Paris. She didn't want to 00:06:48.389 --> 00:06:50.410 be a polished pop star. She wanted to be gritty 00:06:50.410 --> 00:06:52.930 and cool. But she was stuck in the major label 00:06:52.930 --> 00:06:55.089 machine, which, you know, just tries to smooth 00:06:55.089 --> 00:06:57.069 out all your interesting edges. And then the 00:06:57.069 --> 00:06:59.389 accident happens, the accidental hitmaker phase. 00:06:59.889 --> 00:07:01.750 Because for someone who claimed to hate pop, 00:07:02.029 --> 00:07:04.730 she somehow wrote one of the most undeniable, 00:07:04.910 --> 00:07:08.129 inescapable pop songs of the entire 2010s. I 00:07:08.129 --> 00:07:10.230 love it. I crashed my car into the bridge. I 00:07:10.230 --> 00:07:13.139 don't care. I love it. You could not escape that 00:07:13.139 --> 00:07:15.899 song in 2012. It was in every commercial, every 00:07:15.899 --> 00:07:18.680 club, every movie trailer. The story of that 00:07:18.680 --> 00:07:20.720 song is just fascinating. She wrote it in about 00:07:20.720 --> 00:07:23.139 half an hour in a hotel room in Sweden. Just 00:07:23.139 --> 00:07:25.480 pure, unfiltered frustration. So she was just 00:07:25.480 --> 00:07:28.009 venting. Totally. But she hated it for herself. 00:07:28.149 --> 00:07:30.629 She thought it was too shouty, too basic. She 00:07:30.629 --> 00:07:32.850 just couldn't reconcile it with the cool underground 00:07:32.850 --> 00:07:35.069 image she was so desperately trying to build. 00:07:35.170 --> 00:07:37.509 So she gave it away. She gave it to Icona Pop, 00:07:37.910 --> 00:07:41.290 this Swedish duo. And they turned it into a global 00:07:41.290 --> 00:07:44.870 smash. It went to number one in the UK, top 10 00:07:44.870 --> 00:07:48.399 in the US. And Charlie is just... The feature. 00:07:48.500 --> 00:07:50.139 She's the girl who wrote it, but she's not the 00:07:50.139 --> 00:07:52.459 face of it. And she's watching this thing she 00:07:52.459 --> 00:07:54.899 created just take over the world. And then it 00:07:54.899 --> 00:07:57.000 happens again. It happens again with Fancy in 00:07:57.000 --> 00:08:00.800 2014. She writes the hook for Iggy Azalea. First 00:08:00.800 --> 00:08:02.920 things first, I'm the realist. And that becomes 00:08:02.920 --> 00:08:05.100 the song of the summer. I mean, it is still her 00:08:05.100 --> 00:08:08.459 most streamed song ever, even now. And then finally, 00:08:08.500 --> 00:08:11.420 she gets her own hit. A proper solo hit. Boom 00:08:11.420 --> 00:08:13.439 Clap. Boom Clap from the Fault in Our Stars soundtrack. 00:08:13.860 --> 00:08:16.819 And you really cannot get more mainstream, middle 00:08:16.819 --> 00:08:19.839 of the road. pop culture than a John Green movie 00:08:19.839 --> 00:08:22.959 adaptation in 2014. That was peak Tumblr era 00:08:22.959 --> 00:08:27.259 culture. Exactly. So by the end of 2014, Charli 00:08:27.259 --> 00:08:30.959 XCX is statistically a massive pop star. She 00:08:30.959 --> 00:08:33.120 has multiple platinum records. She's on the radio 00:08:33.120 --> 00:08:37.110 constantly, but internally. She is miserable. 00:08:37.309 --> 00:08:39.330 Totally disconnected. Completely. She feels like 00:08:39.330 --> 00:08:41.710 an imposter. She's winning a game she doesn't 00:08:41.710 --> 00:08:43.350 even want to play. And this is the moment where 00:08:43.350 --> 00:08:46.029 most artists would just cash in. You become the 00:08:46.029 --> 00:08:48.750 next Katy Perry. You make Boom Clap 2 .0. You 00:08:48.750 --> 00:08:51.309 ride that wave until it crashes. But Charlie 00:08:51.309 --> 00:08:53.330 did something that I think really defines her 00:08:53.330 --> 00:08:57.980 legacy. She pivoted. Hard. She rejected the machine. 00:08:58.240 --> 00:09:00.639 And it started with the album Sucker in late 00:09:00.639 --> 00:09:03.759 2014. She was so frustrated with the music industry, 00:09:03.840 --> 00:09:05.600 with being told what to do, that she went to 00:09:05.600 --> 00:09:08.100 Sweden, basically isolated herself, and made 00:09:08.100 --> 00:09:10.620 a punk -inspired album in like a month. That's 00:09:10.620 --> 00:09:12.659 where we get break the rules. Which is so on 00:09:12.659 --> 00:09:14.360 the nose. I don't want to go to school. I just 00:09:14.360 --> 00:09:16.779 want to break the rules. It's extremely bratty. 00:09:16.799 --> 00:09:18.679 It is. It's like the Ramones meets bubblegum 00:09:18.679 --> 00:09:21.100 pop. She said she was listening to Weezer and 00:09:21.100 --> 00:09:22.879 the Hives and just wanted to make something loud 00:09:22.879 --> 00:09:26.200 and obnoxious. It was her way of giving the finger 00:09:26.200 --> 00:09:28.779 to the polished pop world that had tried to claim 00:09:28.779 --> 00:09:31.600 her. But honestly, sucker. Yeah. It was just 00:09:31.600 --> 00:09:34.149 the warm up, wasn't it? Yeah. The real revolution, 00:09:34.409 --> 00:09:37.710 the moment the timeline really splits, is 2015 00:09:37.710 --> 00:09:40.769 and 2016. Oh, absolutely. This is the PC music 00:09:40.769 --> 00:09:43.629 turning point. And we throw that term around 00:09:43.629 --> 00:09:45.509 a lot, PC music, but we should probably take 00:09:45.509 --> 00:09:47.710 a second to define what that actually means for 00:09:47.710 --> 00:09:49.669 people who weren't, you know, terminally online 00:09:49.669 --> 00:09:52.549 in 2015. Yes, please. Because it was a whole 00:09:52.549 --> 00:09:55.610 scene. Right. So PC music was a label and an 00:09:55.610 --> 00:09:58.110 art collective, and it was primarily led by a 00:09:58.110 --> 00:10:00.750 producer named A .G. Cook. Their whole aesthetic 00:10:00.750 --> 00:10:04.350 was, well, it was... taking pop tropes and accelerating 00:10:04.350 --> 00:10:07.450 them until they broke. It was incredibly synthetic, 00:10:07.649 --> 00:10:10.169 high gloss with these pitched up, almost chipmunk 00:10:10.169 --> 00:10:13.129 -like vocals and textures that sounded like plastic 00:10:13.129 --> 00:10:15.929 and latex. It was almost a satire of consumerism, 00:10:15.950 --> 00:10:18.009 but at the same time, it genuinely loved pop 00:10:18.009 --> 00:10:20.190 melodies. That's a great description. I always 00:10:20.190 --> 00:10:21.990 said it was music that sounded like it was made 00:10:21.990 --> 00:10:24.289 by a sentient energy drink. That is a perfect 00:10:24.289 --> 00:10:26.450 description. And then in that same orbit, you 00:10:26.450 --> 00:10:30.250 had Sophie. Sophie was a producer. Or the visionary, 00:10:30.470 --> 00:10:33.570 really, who was associated with that scene. And 00:10:33.570 --> 00:10:35.429 she was making some of the most radical sound 00:10:35.429 --> 00:10:38.409 design in history. Sounds that felt like metal 00:10:38.409 --> 00:10:40.870 stretching or bubbles popping or rubber snapping. 00:10:41.269 --> 00:10:43.629 And Charlie meets them. She meets Sophie. And 00:10:43.629 --> 00:10:46.169 they just click. They realize they are both completely 00:10:46.169 --> 00:10:48.789 bored with the status quo of pop music. And together 00:10:48.789 --> 00:10:53.580 they create the Vroom Vroom EP in 2016. I remember 00:10:53.580 --> 00:10:55.480 hearing Vroom Vroom for the first time, the title 00:10:55.480 --> 00:10:58.159 track. It starts with this like sleek, almost 00:10:58.159 --> 00:11:01.519 robotic whisper, let's ride. And then the beat 00:11:01.519 --> 00:11:03.379 drops and it just sounds like a car crash made 00:11:03.379 --> 00:11:05.720 of chrome. It was such a shock. It was tonal 00:11:05.720 --> 00:11:07.840 whiplash for her existing fans. I mean, if you 00:11:07.840 --> 00:11:10.159 were a boom clap fan, Vroom just sounded like 00:11:10.159 --> 00:11:11.980 noise. It was abrasive. It was aggressive. It 00:11:11.980 --> 00:11:14.200 was avant -pop. And the critics were confused. 00:11:14.399 --> 00:11:17.000 Is that a word? Yeah. Confused as being generous. 00:11:17.059 --> 00:11:19.440 A lot of people hated it. Pitchfork gave it a 00:11:19.440 --> 00:11:22.139 4 .5 out of 10. They totally dismissed it. But 00:11:22.139 --> 00:11:23.799 Charlie didn't care. She knew she'd hound her 00:11:23.799 --> 00:11:25.940 sound. This was the moment she stopped trying 00:11:25.940 --> 00:11:28.399 to be a normal pop star and started building 00:11:28.399 --> 00:11:31.000 her own world. And this leads directly to the 00:11:31.000 --> 00:11:34.279 mixtape era. We're talking number one Angel and, 00:11:34.360 --> 00:11:36.759 of course, Pop 2. Pop 2 is the holy grail. Yeah. 00:11:36.879 --> 00:11:39.860 It really is. If you ask any diehard Charlie 00:11:39.860 --> 00:11:42.740 fan, the Angels as they're called, what her best 00:11:42.740 --> 00:11:45.159 work is, I'd say 90 % of them will say Pop 2. 00:11:45.399 --> 00:11:48.620 Okay, so why? What makes that specific mixtape 00:11:48.620 --> 00:11:51.500 so special? It's the blueprint for the 2020s. 00:11:51.500 --> 00:11:53.720 It was released back in 2017, but it sounds like 00:11:53.720 --> 00:11:55.539 it could have been made yesterday. The production 00:11:55.539 --> 00:11:58.080 by A .G. Cook is so dense and layered, but also 00:11:58.080 --> 00:12:01.419 incredibly emotional. And the way she uses autotune, 00:12:01.539 --> 00:12:03.299 she uses it as an instrument. It's not there 00:12:03.299 --> 00:12:05.500 to hide her voice. It's there to texturize it, 00:12:05.559 --> 00:12:08.360 to bend it into these inhuman emotional shapes. 00:12:08.440 --> 00:12:10.379 You listen to a track like track 10. Which we 00:12:10.379 --> 00:12:12.779 gave Blame It On Your Love later. Right. But 00:12:12.779 --> 00:12:15.870 the original track 10, it just. It creates this 00:12:15.870 --> 00:12:20.009 swirling digital emotional landscape that feels 00:12:20.009 --> 00:12:22.649 so incredibly human despite being totally synthetic. 00:12:22.909 --> 00:12:24.950 It's that paradox again. And the features, the 00:12:24.950 --> 00:12:27.649 collaboration on that project is insane. The 00:12:27.649 --> 00:12:30.080 features are key. Because she wasn't just singing 00:12:30.080 --> 00:12:32.519 on the track. She was curating. She was a creative 00:12:32.519 --> 00:12:34.820 director. She brought in Carly Rae Jepsen, who 00:12:34.820 --> 00:12:37.720 is very much a mainstream pop artist, and put 00:12:37.720 --> 00:12:40.320 her on a track with this really distinct, futuristic, 00:12:40.679 --> 00:12:42.940 underground production. Right. She brought in 00:12:42.940 --> 00:12:45.320 Kim Petras before she was huge. She brought in 00:12:45.320 --> 00:12:47.320 Cupcake, the rapper. She brought in Jay Park 00:12:47.320 --> 00:12:50.519 from Korea, Pablo Vittar from Brazil. She created 00:12:50.519 --> 00:12:53.580 this global network of weirdo pop. But we have 00:12:53.580 --> 00:12:56.120 to talk about why she was releasing mixtapes 00:12:56.120 --> 00:12:57.759 instead of official albums, because it wasn't 00:12:57.759 --> 00:12:59.720 just an artistic choice, was it? Yeah. It was 00:12:59.720 --> 00:13:02.600 a reaction to a total disaster. The leaks. This 00:13:02.600 --> 00:13:04.679 is such a crucial part of the lore. In 2017, 00:13:05.039 --> 00:13:06.799 Charlie had finished her third official studio 00:13:06.799 --> 00:13:09.000 album. It was done. It was ready to go. And then 00:13:09.000 --> 00:13:12.340 hackers leaked the entire thing online. Oh, that 00:13:12.340 --> 00:13:14.919 has to be just devastating for an artist. Yeah. 00:13:15.039 --> 00:13:17.000 It's been years working on something and it just 00:13:17.000 --> 00:13:20.059 gets dumped on a random forum for free. It was 00:13:20.059 --> 00:13:22.440 completely traumatizing for her. She said she 00:13:22.440 --> 00:13:24.539 felt violated, like her house had been broken 00:13:24.539 --> 00:13:27.340 into. And typically a label would say, well, 00:13:27.399 --> 00:13:28.799 the cat's out of the bag. Let's just release 00:13:28.799 --> 00:13:30.639 it anyway and try to salvage it. Right. Just 00:13:30.639 --> 00:13:33.840 rush it out. But Charlie said no. She scrapped 00:13:33.840 --> 00:13:36.480 the entire project. She refused to officially 00:13:36.480 --> 00:13:40.480 release what the fans now call XCX World, the 00:13:40.480 --> 00:13:43.299 leak. album which is a huge power move but also 00:13:43.299 --> 00:13:46.539 a massive creative and financial risk it is but 00:13:46.539 --> 00:13:49.100 it forced her to change her entire creative process 00:13:49.100 --> 00:13:51.179 she realized she couldn't sit on music for two 00:13:51.179 --> 00:13:53.940 years waiting for a traditional album rollout 00:13:53.940 --> 00:13:55.799 because it might just get leaked anyway she had 00:13:55.799 --> 00:13:57.820 to be faster she had to be more fluid and the 00:13:57.820 --> 00:14:00.360 mixtape format allowed exactly the mixtape format 00:14:00.360 --> 00:14:03.100 allowed her to completely bypass the label's 00:14:03.100 --> 00:14:05.700 red tape she could make a song on a tuesday and 00:14:05.700 --> 00:14:08.080 decide to release it on a friday it gave her 00:14:08.080 --> 00:14:11.610 all the control so the leaks in a really weird 00:14:11.610 --> 00:14:14.830 roundabout way, created the fast Charlie that 00:14:14.830 --> 00:14:17.470 we know today. Precisely. It turned a complete 00:14:17.470 --> 00:14:20.549 disaster into a new methodology. It made her 00:14:20.549 --> 00:14:23.129 incredibly nimble. Which, as it turns out, prepared 00:14:23.129 --> 00:14:26.190 her perfectly for the next global disaster, the 00:14:26.190 --> 00:14:31.450 pandemic. 2020, the world just shuts down. And 00:14:31.450 --> 00:14:33.350 while most artists were either delaying their 00:14:33.350 --> 00:14:35.889 albums indefinitely or doing these awkward acoustic 00:14:35.889 --> 00:14:38.529 live streams from their living rooms, Charlie 00:14:38.529 --> 00:14:40.970 decided to make an entire album from scratch 00:14:40.970 --> 00:14:44.470 in six weeks. How I'm feeling now. This project 00:14:44.470 --> 00:14:46.629 was just fascinating because she completely tore 00:14:46.629 --> 00:14:48.389 down the wall between the artist and the fan. 00:14:48.570 --> 00:14:51.429 She was on Zoom calls with hundreds of fans asking 00:14:51.429 --> 00:14:53.049 them what they thought about certain lyrics. 00:14:53.289 --> 00:14:56.330 She was on Instagram Live testing out beats A 00:14:56.330 --> 00:14:58.830 .G. Cook was sending her in real time. She asked 00:14:58.830 --> 00:15:01.779 fans to design the artwork. to direct music videos 00:15:01.779 --> 00:15:03.720 from their own homes. It was open source pop 00:15:03.720 --> 00:15:06.080 music. It was a community project. And because 00:15:06.080 --> 00:15:08.000 of that, it was so raw and immediate. She was 00:15:08.000 --> 00:15:09.759 stuck in a house with her boyfriend at the time. 00:15:09.860 --> 00:15:12.259 And the lyrics deal with that specific kind of 00:15:12.259 --> 00:15:14.659 lockdown claustrophobia. You know, songs like 00:15:14.659 --> 00:15:17.970 Detonate or Enemy. These are songs about deeply 00:15:17.970 --> 00:15:20.429 loving someone, but also feeling like you might 00:15:20.429 --> 00:15:22.350 actually explode if you have to look at them 00:15:22.350 --> 00:15:24.610 for one more second in the same room. It captured 00:15:24.610 --> 00:15:26.929 the mood of 2020 better than almost anything 00:15:26.929 --> 00:15:30.769 else. That manic, anxious, bored, loving, hateful 00:15:30.769 --> 00:15:33.830 energy all at once. And technically, it was a 00:15:33.830 --> 00:15:36.840 triumph. She recorded all her own vocals on a 00:15:36.840 --> 00:15:39.120 standard microphone. A .G. Cook was sending beats 00:15:39.120 --> 00:15:41.840 remotely. It proved you don't need a million 00:15:41.840 --> 00:15:43.940 dollar studio to make a masterpiece. You just 00:15:43.940 --> 00:15:46.500 need vision and a laptop. So she's done the punk 00:15:46.500 --> 00:15:48.779 album. She's done the avant -garde mixtapes. 00:15:48.919 --> 00:15:51.899 She's done the DIY quarantine album. She has 00:15:51.899 --> 00:15:54.000 firmly established herself as the queen of the 00:15:54.000 --> 00:15:56.860 underground, the critical darling. And then she 00:15:56.860 --> 00:16:00.809 does a complete 180 again. Clash 2022. The concept 00:16:00.809 --> 00:16:02.789 for Crash was so interesting because she basically 00:16:02.789 --> 00:16:05.330 came out and said, for this album, I'm going 00:16:05.330 --> 00:16:07.549 to play the character of a sellout pop star. 00:16:07.750 --> 00:16:10.090 It was her final album for a contract with Atlantic 00:16:10.090 --> 00:16:12.330 Records, a contract she signed when she was just 00:16:12.330 --> 00:16:15.049 a teenager. And she decided to go out with a 00:16:15.049 --> 00:16:17.710 bang by giving the label exactly what they had 00:16:17.710 --> 00:16:20.429 always wanted from her. Which was a big, glossy, 00:16:20.590 --> 00:16:24.230 80s inspired mainstream pop album. Exactly. The 00:16:24.230 --> 00:16:26.899 aesthetic was very... Deal with the devil. There 00:16:26.899 --> 00:16:30.360 was blood, vampires, car crashes, this dark, 00:16:30.360 --> 00:16:32.639 knowing glamour. She was really leaning into 00:16:32.639 --> 00:16:34.720 the pop machine. She was. She channeled Janet 00:16:34.720 --> 00:16:37.399 Jackson. She learned choreography for the first 00:16:37.399 --> 00:16:40.200 time in her career. She put on the polished outfits. 00:16:40.740 --> 00:16:44.019 And the beautiful irony is it worked. Crash became 00:16:44.019 --> 00:16:47.240 her first number one album in the UK. She proved 00:16:47.240 --> 00:16:49.460 she could beat the main pop girls at their own 00:16:49.460 --> 00:16:52.029 game. Anytime she wanted to. But she did it with 00:16:52.029 --> 00:16:54.490 a wink. Every interview she gave during that 00:16:54.490 --> 00:16:56.470 era, she was sort of breaking the fourth wall, 00:16:56.570 --> 00:16:58.509 acknowledging that she was performing the role 00:16:58.509 --> 00:17:01.490 of the major label bop star. It was performance 00:17:01.490 --> 00:17:03.429 art that just happened to chart really well. 00:17:03.610 --> 00:17:05.509 Which brings us to the era that really changed 00:17:05.509 --> 00:17:07.829 everything. The reason she is holding those Grammys 00:17:07.829 --> 00:17:11.470 right now. The Brat era. 2024. The summer of 00:17:11.470 --> 00:17:13.690 Brat. I don't think we can overstate how completely 00:17:13.690 --> 00:17:17.190 ubiquitous this was. That specific shade of lime 00:17:17.190 --> 00:17:20.230 green. That square was everywhere. Let's talk 00:17:20.230 --> 00:17:22.450 about that green for a second, because it wasn't 00:17:22.450 --> 00:17:24.490 just a random choice. It's tied to the fact that 00:17:24.490 --> 00:17:26.670 Charlie has synesthesia. Okay, break that down. 00:17:26.809 --> 00:17:28.609 Synesthesia is when your sense is kind of cross 00:17:28.609 --> 00:17:31.210 -wire, right? Specifically, she has chromesthesia, 00:17:31.349 --> 00:17:33.369 which is sound -to -color synesthesia. So when 00:17:33.369 --> 00:17:36.650 she hears music, she sees specific colors. She 00:17:36.650 --> 00:17:38.710 has said in interviews that she loves music that 00:17:38.710 --> 00:17:41.549 looks black or pink or purple or red to her. 00:17:41.930 --> 00:17:44.490 Pop 2, for example, she says, is very purple 00:17:44.490 --> 00:17:47.349 and sparkly. Okay, so what about green? She hates 00:17:47.349 --> 00:17:49.890 it. She has said she hates music that sounds 00:17:49.890 --> 00:17:52.769 green, yellow, or brown. She finds those colors 00:17:52.769 --> 00:17:56.029 sonically to be really unappealing. So for Brat, 00:17:56.170 --> 00:17:59.970 an album she considers her masterpiece. She deliberately 00:17:59.970 --> 00:18:03.769 chose this aggressive, ugly, slime green, I think 00:18:03.769 --> 00:18:07.009 it's roughly Pantone 3570C as the cuddle. So 00:18:07.009 --> 00:18:08.630 she picked the color she hates the most for her 00:18:08.630 --> 00:18:10.630 favorite album. It was a challenge. It was a 00:18:10.630 --> 00:18:12.589 provocation. She wanted to take something that 00:18:12.589 --> 00:18:15.109 was on its face, kind of repulsive, and force 00:18:15.109 --> 00:18:16.859 the world to look at it. until they found it 00:18:16.859 --> 00:18:19.640 cool. It was a whole statement on ugly beauty. 00:18:19.759 --> 00:18:22.400 And my God, did it work. It completely took over. 00:18:22.480 --> 00:18:24.559 You had the whole brat summer trend. It was this 00:18:24.559 --> 00:18:27.980 massive rejection of the clean girl aesthetic. 00:18:28.220 --> 00:18:31.019 You know, the beige tones, the slick back buns, 00:18:31.200 --> 00:18:33.859 the green juices that had dominated social media 00:18:33.859 --> 00:18:37.279 for years. Brat was the antidote. It was about 00:18:37.279 --> 00:18:39.720 being messy. It was about smoking cigarettes, 00:18:39.980 --> 00:18:42.420 having a breakdown in the club, being a little 00:18:42.420 --> 00:18:44.480 chaotic and loud. It was a little relatable. 00:18:44.579 --> 00:18:46.910 It tapped into. this deep fatigue people were 00:18:46.910 --> 00:18:49.230 feeling with having to present a perfect curated 00:18:49.230 --> 00:18:52.990 life online. And the music backed it up 100%, 00:18:52.990 --> 00:18:56.750 360, Von Dutch. These are aggressive, confident, 00:18:56.970 --> 00:18:59.869 almost arrogant tracks. But then you have a song 00:18:59.869 --> 00:19:02.299 like Apple. Which sparked that massive TikTok 00:19:02.299 --> 00:19:04.819 dance trend. A huge trend. And the cultural reach 00:19:04.819 --> 00:19:06.400 just went all the way to the top. We have to 00:19:06.400 --> 00:19:08.319 mention the Kamala Harris moment. That's unavoidable. 00:19:08.400 --> 00:19:10.559 Right. So when President Biden stepped down from 00:19:10.559 --> 00:19:12.720 a race and Kamala Harris launched her presidential 00:19:12.720 --> 00:19:16.059 campaign, her social media team immediately adopted 00:19:16.059 --> 00:19:18.519 the brat aesthetic. They used the lime green 00:19:18.519 --> 00:19:21.859 background, the low res, sans serif font. And 00:19:21.859 --> 00:19:24.309 look. Regardless of your politics, just looking 00:19:24.309 --> 00:19:26.789 at it from a cultural analysis perspective, that 00:19:26.789 --> 00:19:29.210 is insane. You have a potential president of 00:19:29.210 --> 00:19:31.710 the United States using the branding of a rave 00:19:31.710 --> 00:19:35.029 pop album that has lyrics about doing bumps of 00:19:35.029 --> 00:19:37.210 coke in the bathroom. It just showed that Charlie 00:19:37.210 --> 00:19:39.789 had finally permeated the monoculture. She wasn't 00:19:39.789 --> 00:19:41.910 just for the cool kids in the know anymore. She 00:19:41.910 --> 00:19:44.049 was the culture. Yeah. And the critics agreed. 00:19:44.650 --> 00:19:47.630 Billboard, Rolling Stone, everyone named Brat 00:19:47.630 --> 00:19:49.950 the album of the year. And the Metacritic score? 00:19:50.230 --> 00:19:54.000 Yeah. It's a 95. That is historically high. That 00:19:54.000 --> 00:19:57.299 puts it in the same league as classic, universally 00:19:57.299 --> 00:19:59.599 agreed upon masterpieces. And she just kept feeding 00:19:59.599 --> 00:20:01.720 the fire with the remix album, Brat and Bat. 00:20:01.960 --> 00:20:04.640 It's completely different, but also still brat. 00:20:04.799 --> 00:20:07.859 The title alone is just genius. But the collaborators 00:20:07.859 --> 00:20:11.200 she got, she got everyone. Ariana Grande. Addison 00:20:11.200 --> 00:20:13.000 Rae. But the most important one, the one that 00:20:13.000 --> 00:20:15.400 felt like a real cultural moment, was the remix 00:20:15.400 --> 00:20:18.140 with Lorde. The girl so confusing remix. This 00:20:18.140 --> 00:20:21.140 was a moment of genuine vulnerability and kind 00:20:21.140 --> 00:20:24.000 of pop culture therapy. For years, the media 00:20:24.000 --> 00:20:26.799 and fans had pitted Charlie and Lorde against 00:20:26.799 --> 00:20:29.990 each other. They were the two alternative pop 00:20:29.990 --> 00:20:33.230 girls with big dark hair who came up around the 00:20:33.230 --> 00:20:35.289 same time. Right. There was always this narrative 00:20:35.289 --> 00:20:38.250 of a rivalry. And on the original track, Charlie 00:20:38.250 --> 00:20:40.650 sings about her own insecurity and her complicated 00:20:40.650 --> 00:20:43.670 feelings about Lorde. She sings, people say we're 00:20:43.670 --> 00:20:46.400 alike. They say we've got the same hair. She 00:20:46.400 --> 00:20:48.400 talks about feeling like Lorde looked down on 00:20:48.400 --> 00:20:50.099 her, thought she was annoying. And then she gets 00:20:50.099 --> 00:20:52.180 Lorde on the remix to respond to those exact 00:20:52.180 --> 00:20:55.460 lyrics. And Lorde's verse was so brutal and beautiful. 00:20:55.740 --> 00:20:58.160 She admitted that she was isolating herself during 00:20:58.160 --> 00:21:00.259 that period because she felt insecure about her 00:21:00.259 --> 00:21:02.759 body and her public image, not because she hated 00:21:02.759 --> 00:21:05.019 Charlie. They basically worked out their beef 00:21:05.019 --> 00:21:07.299 in real time on a track that then went to number 00:21:07.299 --> 00:21:10.900 one. It was reality TV meets high art. And then, 00:21:10.900 --> 00:21:13.420 just to confuse everyone, she throws Bon Iver 00:21:13.420 --> 00:21:16.390 on a remix. Of course she does. Why not? Which 00:21:16.390 --> 00:21:19.809 brings us to where she is now, February 2026, 00:21:19.910 --> 00:21:24.549 because Brat, as huge as it was, already feels 00:21:24.549 --> 00:21:27.549 like it was ages ago in Charlie time. She has 00:21:27.549 --> 00:21:30.029 already moved on to the next 10 things. Her personal 00:21:30.029 --> 00:21:31.609 life seems to have settled down a bit, though. 00:21:31.690 --> 00:21:34.910 She got married last summer, July 2025. Yes, 00:21:34.910 --> 00:21:37.589 to George Daniel, the drummer and main producer 00:21:37.589 --> 00:21:41.450 for the 1975. Which is basically the royal wedding 00:21:41.450 --> 00:21:44.019 of British indie pop. It really is. They had 00:21:44.019 --> 00:21:46.599 a small town hall ceremony in London and then 00:21:46.599 --> 00:21:50.099 a big lavish wedding in Sicily. But even in her, 00:21:50.099 --> 00:21:52.440 you know, settled married life, she's pushing 00:21:52.440 --> 00:21:53.880 buttons. You're talking about the Smart List 00:21:53.880 --> 00:21:56.160 interview? Just a couple of weeks ago, she went 00:21:56.160 --> 00:21:58.900 on the Smart List podcast with Jason Bateman, 00:21:59.079 --> 00:22:01.279 Sean Hayes and Will Arnett. And she was very 00:22:01.279 --> 00:22:03.019 candid. She said she doesn't really want to have 00:22:03.019 --> 00:22:05.819 children. And there was this really awkward moment 00:22:05.819 --> 00:22:08.220 where Jason Bateman kind of questioned her on 00:22:08.220 --> 00:22:10.180 it. Oh, I heard this. Sort of implying that, 00:22:10.220 --> 00:22:12.329 oh, she's young. She might change her mind. Just 00:22:12.329 --> 00:22:14.650 such a classic condescending dad thing to say 00:22:14.650 --> 00:22:17.769 to a woman. It is. But Charlie stood her ground. 00:22:18.170 --> 00:22:20.089 She said she feels like she's married to her 00:22:20.089 --> 00:22:23.250 work. She feels her art is her legacy, her child 00:22:23.250 --> 00:22:25.650 in a way. And it sparked a lot of debate online, 00:22:25.809 --> 00:22:28.049 but it fits her brand perfectly. She refuses 00:22:28.049 --> 00:22:30.430 to follow the expected script. You know, first 00:22:30.430 --> 00:22:33.150 comes love, then comes marriage, then comes baby 00:22:33.150 --> 00:22:35.869 in a baby carriage. Charlie is just rewriting 00:22:35.869 --> 00:22:38.529 that entire nursery rhyme. And the work that 00:22:38.529 --> 00:22:40.430 she's married to is evolving. We aren't just 00:22:40.430 --> 00:22:42.890 talking about albums and mixtapes anymore. She 00:22:42.890 --> 00:22:46.309 is becoming a film mogul. This is the new frontier 00:22:46.309 --> 00:22:49.470 for 2026. She produced the film The Moment, which 00:22:49.470 --> 00:22:52.049 came out last month, and it's this gritty, hyper 00:22:52.049 --> 00:22:53.970 -real drama that's very much inspired by the 00:22:53.970 --> 00:22:56.009 rave scenes she grew up in. And she's acting 00:22:56.009 --> 00:22:58.109 more. She was in the Faces of Death remake. She's 00:22:58.109 --> 00:23:00.509 in the new film I Want Your Sex. But the big 00:23:00.509 --> 00:23:02.529 news, the one that really signals the shift in 00:23:02.529 --> 00:23:04.529 her career, is the score. The fact that she is 00:23:04.529 --> 00:23:07.049 composing the entire score for Emerald Fennell's 00:23:07.049 --> 00:23:09.470 Weathering Heights. That is such a serious pivot. 00:23:09.769 --> 00:23:11.950 Emerald Fennell, I mean, promising young woman. 00:23:12.269 --> 00:23:15.789 Saltburn. She has a very specific, twisted, pop 00:23:15.789 --> 00:23:18.390 -infused aesthetic. So Charlie seems like a perfect 00:23:18.390 --> 00:23:22.170 match, but scoring a gothic period piece. It 00:23:22.170 --> 00:23:24.470 suggests that Charlie is looking at a career 00:23:24.470 --> 00:23:27.289 like Trent Reznor or Johnny Greenwood. You know, 00:23:27.329 --> 00:23:30.630 musicians who started in rock or pop and then 00:23:30.630 --> 00:23:32.750 became these serious Oscar -winning composers. 00:23:33.329 --> 00:23:36.569 It's a bid for longevity. Pop stars have a shelf 00:23:36.569 --> 00:23:39.400 life. Composers can work forever. And the new 00:23:39.400 --> 00:23:41.420 music she's been releasing reflects that, too. 00:23:41.539 --> 00:23:44.180 Yeah. She released that track house late last 00:23:44.180 --> 00:23:46.579 year. Featuring John Cale. From the Velvet Underground. 00:23:46.779 --> 00:23:49.259 I mean. You cannot signal your artistic intentions 00:23:49.259 --> 00:23:51.519 more clearly than that. The Velvet Underground 00:23:51.519 --> 00:23:54.420 is basically the genesis of all art rock. So 00:23:54.420 --> 00:23:56.460 by working with John Cale, Charlie is placing 00:23:56.460 --> 00:23:58.740 herself directly in that lineage. She's saying, 00:23:58.839 --> 00:24:01.440 I'm not just the I love it girl. I'm an avant 00:24:01.440 --> 00:24:03.779 -garde artist with real history. And wall of 00:24:03.779 --> 00:24:06.349 sound. The track that dropped in January of this 00:24:06.349 --> 00:24:09.950 year, it's dense. It feels orchestral, but it 00:24:09.950 --> 00:24:13.289 still has those glitched out futuristic vocals. 00:24:13.650 --> 00:24:15.970 It's the synthesis. That's what it is. She's 00:24:15.970 --> 00:24:18.269 taking the classical sweeping elements of a film 00:24:18.269 --> 00:24:20.490 score and mashing them together with the hyper 00:24:20.490 --> 00:24:23.029 modern PC music production she pioneered. It 00:24:23.029 --> 00:24:25.750 sounds like the future again. So let's zoom out. 00:24:25.829 --> 00:24:28.349 What does this all mean? We've looked at the 00:24:28.349 --> 00:24:32.230 rave kid, the reluctant pop star, the punk, the 00:24:32.230 --> 00:24:37.420 curator. the sellout, the brat, and now maybe 00:24:37.420 --> 00:24:40.180 the composer. I think CharlieXCX represents the 00:24:40.180 --> 00:24:42.839 final collapse of the binary. For decades, we 00:24:42.839 --> 00:24:45.259 had this rule in music. You were either underground, 00:24:45.579 --> 00:24:48.299 which meant you were cool, credible, but probably 00:24:48.299 --> 00:24:51.299 broke, or you were mainstream, which meant you 00:24:51.299 --> 00:24:53.700 were kind of lame, but rich and famous. You couldn't 00:24:53.700 --> 00:24:55.519 be both. You were either Nirvana or you were 00:24:55.519 --> 00:24:57.259 New Kids on the Block. There was no in -between. 00:24:57.460 --> 00:25:00.200 Exactly. Charlie proved that distinction is dead. 00:25:00.700 --> 00:25:02.920 She proved that you can make the weirdest, most 00:25:02.920 --> 00:25:05.920 abrasive, sometimes ugly music possible. And 00:25:05.920 --> 00:25:07.480 if you have the vision and package it right, 00:25:07.619 --> 00:25:09.700 you can sell out Madison Square Garden and win 00:25:09.700 --> 00:25:12.359 Grammys with it. She turned outsider status into 00:25:12.359 --> 00:25:14.740 the ultimate insider credential. Everyone wants 00:25:14.740 --> 00:25:16.740 to be in Charlie's world now. Yeah. The weird 00:25:16.740 --> 00:25:19.920 girl from Bishop Stortford, she won. She absolutely 00:25:19.920 --> 00:25:22.420 did. And the final provocative thought I have 00:25:22.420 --> 00:25:26.160 is this. Charlie began her career actively hating 00:25:26.160 --> 00:25:29.140 pop music. She spent 10 years deconstructing 00:25:29.140 --> 00:25:31.859 it, mocking it, breaking it apart, and putting 00:25:31.859 --> 00:25:36.220 it back together wrong. But in doing so, she 00:25:36.220 --> 00:25:38.759 actually saved it. She made pop music interesting 00:25:38.759 --> 00:25:41.759 and dangerous again. Which raises the question, 00:25:41.980 --> 00:25:45.480 if she is now scoring films and working with... 00:25:45.609 --> 00:25:49.589 legends like John Cale. Is her pop star era actually 00:25:49.589 --> 00:25:52.049 over? Or is she just redefining what a pop star 00:25:52.049 --> 00:25:54.470 does in the late 2020s? Maybe the new pop star 00:25:54.470 --> 00:25:56.910 isn't just a singer. Maybe they are a world builder, 00:25:57.009 --> 00:25:59.710 a composer, a director, a curator. That is the 00:25:59.710 --> 00:26:01.069 question we're going to be watching for the rest 00:26:01.069 --> 00:26:03.589 of 2026 for sure. Indeed. We want to know what 00:26:03.589 --> 00:26:06.029 you think about all this. Is the pivot to film 00:26:06.029 --> 00:26:09.069 the right move for her? Are you still bumping 00:26:09.069 --> 00:26:11.869 brat two years later? Let us know. I certainly 00:26:11.869 --> 00:26:13.789 am. It's still on repeat. Check out the show 00:26:13.789 --> 00:26:15.680 notes for this one. We've linked all the deep 00:26:15.680 --> 00:26:17.960 cuts we talked about, the interviews, and a playlist 00:26:17.960 --> 00:26:19.779 of every song we mentioned today, including that 00:26:19.779 --> 00:26:22.140 Wild John Cale collaboration. It's definitely 00:26:22.140 --> 00:26:24.000 worth a deep dive. Thanks for listening. We'll 00:26:24.000 --> 00:26:25.859 see you on the next one. Bye. See ya.