God this album irritates me so much.
It represents a massively disappointing step back into familiarly for Charli, after it really seemed that she was taking her music into far weirder and yet so sonically fascinating places. Hey, Charli (baby), wha’ happen? You’re just doing a pop album now? You’re just gonna reign in the experimentation and simply give us an album of solid gold pop bangers? And, to rub it in even more, you’re going to make this one of the most pristine collections of electro pop imaginable? So you’re going to turn your back on the future, burn it down, salt the Earth, then just set off absolute firecrackers in the mainstream that now lays in front of you?? Then just fill it with absolutely sodding perfect songs?? Fuck you, Charli, that’s so annoying!
And some of ‘Crash’ seems so basic in its composition, making instantly recognisable samples from widely known songs like Cry for You or Show Me Love and just making them as the sole backing of another song? Like, I know Beyoncé made such unimaginative pilfering acceptable in 2022, but doesn’t it feel a little bit of a let down for an artist or Charli’s (or Beyoncé’s) talent to restrict themselves to such formulaic (no, I didn’t say lazy. I just thought it) compositions?
The annoying thing for Beyoncé was how generic and uninspired the resulting album sounded. The even more annoying thing for Charli is how she still makes it all work so well. Like, as a writer, what the fuck am I supposed to do with that? The narrative obviously demands that ‘Crash’ is a underwhelming attempt for Charli to weakly make a move back towards the mainstream to ensure as big a crowd as possible when she returned to her beloved live shows after the stresses of COVID. But no, the album’s fucking amazing. There’s no fucking story here!
Officially, I think this album is pants, because recognising its quality would set a bad precedent.
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