Charli XCX - Sucker

There was a brief period when the music video for Break the Rules emerged that I entered a fit of token hipster eye-rolling. Here was an excellent talisman of pop music reducing herself to the most banal of teenage, rebellious Americana and at the height of her crossover from indie darling to certified, chart-dominating success story. I understand how awful it always sounds.

I'm not quite so bitter as some (seriously, what a fucking douchey closing paragraph), though, and if I'm going to go forward with any gripes about this album it's the fear that its ridiculous pushbacks and rescheduled release dates might dent its chances of coming anywhere near the top of our charts. Atlantic's potential failure to strike whilst the iron is hot may of course be endemic to the many, many stars that I tend to take to my heart, and it shouldn't by any means change the fact that Charli XCX is enjoying a fantastic lifestyle right now, but I don't know. Sometimes the world of pop is an unjust place. Charli XCX brightens it a little.

A title track sounding suspiciously like the very few remnants of the discography of Republica (that band that still, perplexingly, soundtrack much of the Sky Sports News adverts, which if you think about it is as absurd as the idea of Elastica tunes still being used to adverise BT) hammers home the very quintessentially British, punchy theme that's to come from its namesake album. The undeniably catchy, aforementioned 'Break the Rules' seems to have translated, with its eye-poppingly simple lyrics, better elsewhere, but aside from an assured delivery and finely-polished instrumental it justs comes off as rather unimpressing. Similarly, the riffs and tempo of 'London Queen' are incendiary, but lyrically ("I never thought I'd be living in the USA, doing things the American way-ay-ay"; the British "oi!"s shouted like a shiny-faced YouTuber doing an impression of a Sex Pistols track) strikes me as pointlessly brash and obnoxious.

She allows for a less annoying singalong vibe on 'Breaking Up', a song that magically restores the idea that Aitchison is able to weave multiple hooks together into something with repeated-listen appeal, and - thank God - it can be said of the rest of the album. Indeed, I'm struggling to remember an album with a double-whammy of pop magnificence (I suppose it would have to be The Fame Monster, aka the New Testament) as good as singles 'Doing It' and 'Boom Clap': the former was the inescapable radio behemoth attributed to The Fault in Our Stars, and we're all thankful that mediocre teen movies exist if they're going to launch pop careers into the stratosphere like that. The latter has since been revamped with a part of the song sung (needlessly, but we'll let it slide) by Rita Ora, but it hasn't lost any of its effortless cool or dream-pop grandeur.

It's not all straightforward "pop punk" nonsense and surefire radio hits; there're actual glimpses of daring and unorthodox inclusions for your typical pop princess album. 'Body of My Own' is a love letter to the act of masturbation set to what sounds like the boss music from Street Fighter, there's casual drug use on the glorious 'Famous', and Vampire Weekend's Rostam Batmanglij lends that band's particularly odd and endearing touches to closer 'Need Ur Luv', a tongue-in-cheek bit of emotional vulnerability. Unfortunately, there are those tracks that you might've expected and dreaded: 'Gold Coins' finds her with full bragging rights and the keys to her own fortress of money (again, not so punk, but shush), whilst 'Hanging Around' actually resurrects Weezer's Beverly Hills for no goddamn reason.

A lot of what disappoints about Sucker can probably be put down to the production credits: True Romance was helmed by the indomitable Ariel Rechtshaid and had passing influences from Gold Panda and Blood Diamonds, so it was always going to be a tough act to follow. The names here might be bigger, but Benny Blanco (forever problematic) and StarGate - whose last three big hits are probably Black Widow (the less said the better), Selena Gomez's Come & Get It (ditto) and that silly song about foxes - certainly bring little to the fold and their inconsistent, wishy-washy tracklisting ends up on the verge of turning Charli XCX into another bland popstar. She just about comes on top, though, and her craft and appeal seem - for now - unable to be squashed. Let's hope for fewer bratty Gwen Stefani anthems* on album three.

Rating: 7.5/10
Highlights: Doing It; Boom Clap; Famous; Die Tonight; Breaking Up
Avoid: London Queen; Hanging Around

Artwork Watch: Hair and make-up bag an instant 10/10 but that top belongs in a bag left outside Oxfam.
Up next: Purity Ring
 
*unless they sound as good as Break the Rules