Charli XCX dropped her new single "rock music" on Friday, along with a music video, and made her intentions plain in the opening lyric: "I think the dance floor is dead, so now we're making rock music."
Whether the song qualifies as rock will almost certainly be debated. According to The Hollywood Reporter, the track features hard-charging, heavily distorted guitar laid over synthesized vocals. Billboard described it as "a dizzying one-minute and 55-second track that is more or less a grungy dance track with a guitar riff," and noted it would still sound at home on a dance floor. Charli's management had told Billboard in April that she was working on her eighth album, and she had already been dropping hints about its direction, including telling British Vogue there might be some rock inspiration.
"For me, it's fun to flip the form," Charli told British Vogue. "We know there's gonna be people who are bothered by it, but that's fine."
The music video, shot largely in black and white, shows Charli walking through a city, making out with strangers and chain smoking. The black and white palette breaks into color only when she hits the chorus and delivers the "rock music" declaration, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
The single arrives as Charli has been expanding well beyond pop music. She released a companion album for Wuthering Heights in February and co-wrote much of the soundtrack for Mother Mary with producer Jack Antonoff. She also produced and starred in the mockumentary The Moment, which came out in January. The new single is now confirmed to be the opening move toward her eighth studio album, though no release date has been announced.
Billboard noted that the release lands alongside a packed new music Friday that included MUNA's fourth album Dancing On the Wall, Kelela's new single "linknb" ahead of her upcoming album New Avatar, and Lykke Li's sixth and reportedly final career album The Afterparty. Still, Charli's pivot dominated conversation.
The British pop star is also set for a run of major festival appearances this summer and fall. She is headlining Lollapalooza in Chicago in July, Outside Lands in San Francisco in August, and Austin City Limits in October.
