Enfnts Terribles

On April 6th, Charli XCX surprised everyone by announcing that she had started working on an album, that she labeled herself as a quarantine album. Instead of doing endless amounts of livestreams to promote her previous releases, the Los Angeles-based pop culture starlet gathered all her courage to start her most aspiring project to date.

Do It XCX-self

The singer communicated with fans through Zoom calls, livestreams, and DMs to ask for their opinions, thoughts, and input. Fans were a big part of the album process. Instead of doing many writing sessions or collaborations, this project was very ‘Do It XCX-self’ (read DIY but as Charli). Because, looking at the production credits, only a handful of people were involved this time.

For the artworks, Charli could count on her endlessly talented fans that helped her create a visual world. A nice initiative because there couldn’t be a better platform for young visual designers to share their craft and collaborate with one of the most celebrated pop-acts in the world. The music video of “Forever” was also a nice way for Charli to join forces with her fans. She asked fans to send in videos of themselves doing things, which later got edited into one big music video.

For “Claws”, Charli XCX set up a green screen in her home and asked her boyfriend to record. The raw video material was later processed and made into a music video. But the singer also posted the raw greenscreen video recordings on social media, for her fans to play with. Which made for some interesting videos — like Charli XCX dancing in front of a wall of poppers. The boundaries between creatives and Charli were never lower.