Misery, but make it sleek— on Charli XCX’s Pop 2
One of the most lovable qualities of Pop 2, Charli XCX’s 2017 mixtape, is how she conceptualises her obsession, heartbreak, desire, into something so effortlessly stylish. The highlight of the mixtape, “Track 10,” begins with a spluttering of sped up sounds, scratching glitch noises. Charli’s voice is ethereal, backed by moody synths. She sings variations of the same phrase, repeated, autotuned, sped up and then packed together as tightly as possible. The production, credited extensively to A.G Cook, founder of PC Music, is drenched in synths and samples, layered endlessly to create a well planned mess of sound. As the track builds, the glitches become more pronounced and Charli becomes more and more overtaken by the synths eventually swallowing her whole. It’s a deliberately messy and excessive track, but rather than distracting, the more destructive it becomes, the more you are drawn in. The result is chaotic, danceable and one of the best songs released in 2017.
As I waited quietly in the queue to see Charli XCX on her Pop 2 tour, a voice screamed “the gays are out tonight!” Playing to a small theatre, Charli XCX spoke of how grateful she was for the love extended to her from the LGBT community. For the track “Boys”, she brought out an array of backup dancers from the queer community. It hadn’t had crossed my mind how strange that the same artist whose most successful solo hit was a single off a soundtrack to a John Green movie, had become a queer icon.
Charli XCX wasn’t always a cult figure in pop and gay stan circles (the delineation between the two is meaningless, the Venn diagram is just a circle). Writing songs since 14, Charli released mixtapes which pushed her into the illegal rave scene in London. Her first major break was the song “I Love It” co-written with Swedish pop duo Icona Pop in 2012. In 2014, her collaboration with Iggy Azalea, “Fancy”, was the most streamed song on Spotify that year and dominated the charts until it was unseated by the reggae-pop hit “Rude” by Magic who we all remember. Her first major solo hit, “Boom Clap”, was a part of The Fault In Our Stars soundtrack and charted reasonably well. At the same time, Atkinson was working as a prolific songwriter to acts such as Rihanna, Sky Ferreira and Gwen Stefani.
Her albums, True Romance and Sucker released to reasonably positive press coverage but lacked distinct character within the pop landscape. This changed dramatically in 2015 with the release of Vroom Vroom. The first collaboration with Scottish experimental producer SOPHIE, the four-track EP featured heavy sampling with abrasive and squeaky synths. The result was chaotic, messy and excessive, and allowed Charli to explore new musical ground which was still (relatively) young at the time.
Around this time Charli hires A.G Cook as her creative director. Cook is the founder of PC Music, a record label and art collective which takes heavy influence from the Vaporwave movement of the early 2010’s. Frustrated with her label, Charli released and recorded with the assistance of Cook and other PC Music acts such as SOPHIE, Easy FX and Danny L Harle. The result are the 2017 mixtapes, №1 Angel and Pop 2.
Pop 2 is positioned as a vision of pop and its future. The album is dominated by glossy production and heavy sampling, but never once feels unintentionally artificial, despite Charli’s heavy use of autotune. Rather than singing aid, Charli and her team use autotune to grant her voice new textures, accentuating rather than flattening her personality. “Don’t come with a guarantee / I’ll use you up like you’re my battery” she sings on the auto-tune ladened “Femmebot”, a tribute to human desire and its all encompassing effects.
Even when Charli mopes, she does it with utmost style. On the echo-heavy opener “Backseat”, Charli and pop darling Carly Rae Jepsen replicate a melodic experience of isolation. Jepsen and Charli sing back and forth, drenched in autotune, eventually culminating in the endless sampling of the word “alone”. The result is hypnotic, moody and moving. “Tears”, featuring Caroline Polachek is another excellent display of Charli’s excess. Detailing the crumbling of an already strained relationship, the chorus is backed by melodic screaming as Polachek and Charli trade lines, the vocal distortions making their voices barely discernible.
This production is not only supported by a ambitious production crew, but an extensive roster of guest stars. Of Pop 2’s ten tracks, two do not include any features. Aside from the prior mentioned, Pop 2 features support from Danish electro pop artist MØ, Estonian rapper Tommy Cash, and German songwriter Kim Petras. Nowhere does this collaborative spirit come alive more than in “I Got It”. Charli is more than happy to serve as connective tissue, reciting the hook around verses from Brooke Candy, CupcakKe, and Pabllo Vittar.
Pop 2 is a team tribute to gloss, style, and excess. It’s flavour is bubblegum covered in dirt, chewy with crunch, bright but abrasive, sugar sweet, even when it’s spent the last hour sobbing on the floor.
A week later her after her headline set, Charli supported Taylor Swift on her Reputation tour in Sydney. She launched into a set which excluded work from her mixtapes. It’s a disappointment that a large portion of her listenership ignores the majority of her best work, but Charli handles the stadium with the same confidence which fills the theatre, raising the audience to their feet with ease. It’s with utter confidence that Charli XCX straddles between these two worlds, between stadium success and an independent approach to pop. Her style, versatility and ability have made her one of the most interesting and unique talents in the pop landscape.
