On Oct. 11, Charli xcx released the long-awaited remix album of her zeitgeist-defining record “BRAT.” The new project, entitled “Brat and it’s completely different but also still brat,” features remixes of all 15 tracks on “BRAT,” alongside remixes of two of the album’s three bonus tracks.
Every song features at least one new artist, each of whom brings their own sensibilities to Charli’s maximalist vision of life as an endless cycle of sex, drugs and 120 bpm.
Part of why the “BRAT” remix album works so well is because the songs are actually remixes. In a pop landscape where music is produced and marketed as quickly and cheaply as possible, remixes have become divorced from their original purpose.
Coinciding with the emergence of hip-hop and dance music in the 1980s, remixes became a way for outside producers and artists to come onto a track and turn it into something entirely new. Nowadays, so many songs that are touted as remixes are nothing more than pop songs with generic rap verses tacked on.
The vast majority of the songs on Charli’s new project don’t sound much like their original versions — and the “BRAT” remix album is all the better for it.
The production on the original “BRAT” album is an exciting fusion of traditional pop formulas with elaborate electronic flourishes. On the remix album, Charli — alongside frequent collaborators such as A.G. Cook and George Daniel — pushes the sound of modern dance music into its further possible realm.
Tracks such as “Sympathy is a knife” and “365” are some of the standard record’s intensest moments, but in their remixed versions, featuring Ariana Grande and Shygirl, respectively, they devolve into a complete experimental free-for-all — transporting the listener straight to a dimly lit, late-night warehouse rave. You can feel the strobe lights blinding your eyes and the sweaty bodies surrounding you. Charli, as an artist, can take you right into that moment because it’s a space she knows intimately.
Some of the tracks aren’t that sonically different from their original versions, and on these, Charli intelligently employs artists who are sure to provide an unmissable moment. “Girl, so confusing featuring lorde” and “Guess featuring billie eilish” both became all anyone could talk about online within minutes of their release, with lines like “let’s work it out on the remix” and “Charli likes boys but she knows I’d hit it” instantly joining the pop culture lexicon.
So much of contemporary “dance” music falls flat because it’s designed solely to be played in H&M, but “BRAT” succeeds because Charli is a student of the genre and the atmospheres that it thrives in. As a teenager, she posted her tracks on Myspace, which grabbed the attention of underground rave organizers. What started out as a hobby that Charli’s parents would accompany her to as a 14-year-old girl has turned into a career as one of the most innovative pop stars of the 21st century.
Even as she’s found a global audience, Charli hasn’t left behind the environment she cut her teeth in.
“That whole scene really inspires me,” Charli said in a 2012 interview with Rolling Stone. “The fashion, the music, etc. Even with its stereotypes and limited scope, it really helped me become who I am as a performer today.”
Just like with the other instantly iconic dance record of the 2020s, Beyoncé’s “Renaissance,” Charli’s vast knowledge of the genre works to her advantage on “BRAT.” Like Beyoncé’s Grammy-winning record, “BRAT” is a textbook, inviting listeners to take a journey alongside the artist through the progression of dance music, moving between decades and subgenres with an ease that only a master of her craft could possess.
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“Brat and it’s completely different but also still brat” serves as a victory lap for Charli xcx in what’s been her biggest year yet. Hopefully her return to A-list status causes new fans to explore her discography, which includes some of the most forward-thinking pop music in recent years. Its highlights include the albums “True Romance” and “how i’m feeling now,” as well as the mixtape “Pop 2.”
Charli has an artistic vision and level of taste that is matched by few of her peers, and the immense success of “BRAT” and its accompanying remix album proves that tenfold.
Elijah Ritch is a freelance reporter for the Daily Lobo. They can be reached at culture@dailylobo.com or on X @dailylobo
