Charli xcx believes her next album will be a “flop” after the mind-blowing success of ‘Brat’.
The ‘Von Dutch’ singer is not feeling any “pressure” to top her chart-topping record which dominated mainstream pop in 2024 – but she doesn’t anticipate her follow-up will do as well.
She told Culted: “I was really doing it for myself. I had no clue people would connect with it the way they did. I don’t feel the pressure because you can never really do the same thing twice. My next record will probably be a flop, which I’m down for.”
Charli recently admitted she is finding it “really hard to let go of” ‘Brat’.
The ‘360’ hitmaker dominated pop culture with her 2024 LP and has admitted she would love to extend her ‘Brat’ era for as long as possible, because it’s who she is, but she also understands that everything has a “lifespan”.
Addressing the future of ‘Brat’ in an honest TikTok, she began: “Yesterday I made this TikTok about, ‘Summer again?’ And I was kind of joking but also maybe serious.
“I don’t know. Um, but it got me thinking about it is really hard to let go of ‘Brat,’ and let go of this thing that is so inherently me, and become my entire life.”
However, she admitted she likes the “tension of staying too long”.
She continued: “You know? I started thinking about culture and the ebbs and flows of the lifespan of things. Then, how when you get a level of success, you can become oversaturated and then people want you to disappear – which I understand, and I am sort of a believer in that.
“I think it allows artists to retain their cool when they are so in everyone’s faces, then they vanish. But I am also interested in the tension of staying too long. I find that quite fascinating in what that does.”
Hinting ‘Brat’ could stick around, Charli added: “But yeah, it’s obviously hard to just be like, ‘Ok. It’s over now.’ I kind of want it to go on and on and one because it is who I am. I’ve been thinking about ‘Brat’ long before the record came out. I’ve sat here on my own for two year prior thinking about how I’m going to communicate this record to the world. Not just the music but the whole visual identity of the album.”
Charli concluded: “I just kind of want it to keep going.”
‘Brat’ sparked a whole pop culture phenomenon with the ‘Brat Girl’ persona, while the sickly green colour used on the album cover inspired TikTok trends, fashion, and even a crossover into politics with the US presidential election when Charli branded Democrat Kamala Harris “Brat”. The term was also crowned Collins Dictionary word of the year.