Charli XCX Makes A Solid Seasonal Change With Wuthering Heights | Album Review
From Brat Summer to Wuthering Winter indeed.
Few modern artists are experts of their own history like Charli XCX is. Whether it’s remixing her old songs into new ones or literally morphing her own record into something completely different (that’s still the album), she’s been in command of her domain for a long time now. That fact keeps Wuthering Heights tied to what came before it despite taking a sharp left turn from the lime green laser that was BRAT. Inspired by the recent film of the same name and full of dramatic strings to match, Wuthering Heights is a fully formed follow up to one of this decade’s greatest albums. Charli commits to this new goth style fully by filling it with her maximalist pop vision, finding inspiration in the past while being rooted in this new direction. It’s by no means as much of a statement as BRAT is, but it’s fine to not be that.
Right off the bat, Charli hits you with a completely different vision. “House” climaxes with shrill horns and strings that will crush you unlike anything she’s offered before, at least sound-wise. Combine that John Cale’s haunting spoken-word intro and you won’t find a bigger left-turn from BRAT and its sharp synthpop sheen. But the track’s hugeness isn’t foreign to Charli; songs like “Von dutch” and “Cross You Out” are similarly cavernous. Sky Ferreira, the latter song’s guest, pops up on “Eyes of the World”, and that song along with “Chains of Love” give more of the classic pop magic that Charli owns. Most of all, they’re all well constructed, catchy songs. It’s a tad disappointing that no other track on the album is as cacophonous as “House” is, but this new coat of paint doesn’t muddy Charli’s overall skill at crafting great music.
That skill translates well into a more radio friendly version of what The Last Dinner Party or Black Country, New Road have been doing lately. “Dying for You” weaves in True Romance-era sounds (something Charli herself acknowledged) with garbled audio clipping into the jagged strings that form the song’s backbone. If that song cuts, then “Out of Myself” and its layered strings positively knife through you. The songs with more ballad-like melodies call back to different moments; I hear “Lucky” from Pop 2 all throughout “Wall of Sound”, only more The Cure than progressive pop.
When “Funny Mouth”, the album’s closer co-written by Djo, descends into a chaotic swirl of BRAT-era sounds wrapping themselves around a monstrous chamber pop instrumental, you really can’t be surprised with what Charli’s cooked up. Wuthering Heights is by no means Charli’s most impactful or memorable record, but it takes an artist capable of making one of the decade’s best albums to create a worthy follow up. She’s clearly content to experiment, and she’s clearly earned the right to do so.
Verdict: 7.7/10
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