Review: Charli XCX contemplates stardom in single remix

POP/ROCK

Charli XCX, “Sympathy Is a Knife”

Now that her “Brat” album has given Charli XCX her long-deserved mass pop audience, she has recharged it with a follow-up album of remixes: “Brat and It’s Completely Different but Also Still Brat.” On the first version of “Sympathy Is a Knife,” she sang about personal insecurities and a rivalry she couldn’t help feeling, “‘Cause I couldn’t even be her if I tried.” The remix has the same two-note synthesizer riff but a new lyric about the vicious precarity of 21st-century stardom: “It’s a knife when you’re finally on top/’cause magically the next step is they wanna see you fall to the bottom.” Ariana Grande, who has been through her own fame roller coaster, makes a natural ally.

Victoria Monét, “The Greatest”

After racking up songwriting credits for Ariana Grande, Selena Gomez, Blackpink and others, in 2023 Monét released an album of her own, “Jaguar II,” that won her a Grammy for best new artist. Her new deluxe version nearly doubles it, adding 10 tracks including “The Greatest,” a plush, undulating track full of bliss, gratitude and a little self-congratulation: “I look around and life is what I made it.”

Halsey, “I Never Loved You”

On “The Great Impersonator,” a new album due Oct. 25, Halsey practices the sincerest form of flattery — naming influences, posing as them in photos and writing songs in their style. “I Never Loved You” is a Kate Bush homage: a somber, swelling piano ballad that envisions death after unsuccessful heart surgery and tries to absolve a partner from lingering guilt. “I never loved you,” Halsey sings, but then partly takes it back. “I never loved you in vain.”

Like the title track to the album she released earlier this year, “Don’t Forget Me,” Rogers’ new single obsesses over longing and memories. It’s a folk-rocker that piles up electric guitars until it verges on a power ballad. With barely a hint of recrimination, she sings about the ex she still hasn’t gotten over: “I would have given every song I’ve ever written/Just to spend one day with you,” she vows. And while she tries to graciously let go, she can’t help thinking, “Do you still wonder about me?”

The Linda Lindas, “No Obligation”

The title track of the new album by the Linda Lindas, “No Obligation” snarls back at any expectations that girls should be subdued, obedient and wearing a dress. It’s a galloping, four-chord punk stomp that packs plenty of exasperation into its two minutes.

The Coward Brothers, “Always”

T Bone Burnett and Elvis Costello recorded together in 1985 as the Coward Brothers, and Burnett assembled a band of roots-rock studio stalwarts to back Costello on his 1986 album “King of America,” which will get a vastly expanded reissue in November. They’re back together, 21st-century style, for “The Coward Brothers,” a mock-biographical podcast in the style of a vintage radio drama and a companion album of new songs with a vintage patina. The opening song, “Always,” has a richly harmonized chorus that hints at Buddy Holly and the Beach Boys, straightforwardly declaring, “I want you always.” The verses, true to both songwriters, play with paradoxes.

Shawn Mendes, “Shawn”

Kylie Minogue, “Tension II”

Jennifer Hudson, “The Gift of Love”

MC5, “Heavy Lifting”