how i'm feeling now
5/16/20

How would you describe yourself completely to a stranger? What would you start with? Your name perhaps, as an introduction. Maybe where you grew up, your hobbies, your job, your family. Eventually you have nothing left to divulge. Your entire personality, your deepest secrets, your essence has been disclosed to someone you’ve never met before. Who might know you better then, this stranger or your closest friend?

This is the dichotomy at play for Charli XCX right now. Years after her album Sucker came the release of Charli, an outline of Charli XCX at her most authentic self. After a significant shift in sonic palette, this album was an important re-introduction for Charli. In interviews and letters to fans (Notes app screenshots of course) she stressed the encapsulating nature of this project. Charli and her friends were teaming up to give you Charlotte Achison in full. And she delivered. Aching ballads (“Thoughts”, “White Mercedes”), posse tracks (“Click”, “Shake It”), and songs from 100 years in the future (“Next Level Charli”, “2099”) help paint a complete, fully formed image of Charli XCX. Charli is an album for a world of strangers. Here, Charli XCX presented her case. Name: Charli. Occupation: Savior of Pop. This served a double purpose: cementing her image as the avant-pop songstress for the hardcore fans, and preparing her for a mainstream breakthrough that could be on the horizon, and could be in the rear view mirror. Charli is an album prepared to meet the person Shazam-ing “Boom Clap” at Limited Too (forgive the anachronism) halfway, and welcome them into the world of Charli XCX. She worked hard to craft this version of herself carefully, and presented it with grace and precision. This is her conversation with the stranger.

To listen to how i'm feeling now is to know Charli XCX as a close friend. Anxiety, love, loneliness, and boredom are presented without glamor. Emotions fall apart at the seams. “I’ll love you forever” is both affirming and precarious. “I’m so bored” is blunt and without solution. “I don’t trust myself at all / why should you trust me?” is a brutal confession and plea for companionship. There’s no time or space for preparation here, and it’s a good thing. Charli is less concerned with capturing her truest essence as she is capturing her state of mind moment by moment.

Every song on how i'm feeling now threatens to swallow Charli whole, with rushes of sea-salt spray noise bursting up above the ocean of rave-ready banger beats. But the piercing clarity of the lyrics cut through with an excising sharpness, and we see that Charli isn’t drowning but bending the sonic wash to her will. “I miss them every night / I miss them by my side” glides over the snapping snares and pitched-up vocal loop on “c2.0.” The vocals and production clash and coordinate like two expert fighters on “Pink Diamond” with raw and sparkling results. Impulse takes center stage on this album, and if you’re Charli XCX, impulse means making hits.

Trusting yourself is hard, and knowing yourself is even harder. how i'm feeling now is Charli XCX trusting her vision, no longer making music to present herself to an anonymous public but making music to express the parts of herself that cannot be described. And it sounds amazing.