“Tonight, I’m gon’ be rockin’ it / Droppin’ it / Shake my ass, no stoppin’ it / I look hot in it, hot in it…”
It’s Charli, baby.
Madame XCX might be X-iting soon from Atlantic Records following the release of Crash, the fifth and final studio album in her label deal, but not before supplying a one-off with the legendary Dutch dance floor king himself, Tiësto.
Always one to spotlight a dance-pop diva – “The Motto” with our favorite (formerly) lopsided wig wearer Ava Max remains one of the best songs of the past year, mm-mm – the Kaleidoscope king has done us all a solid and linked up with our favorite Demon Twink magnet to provide us with “Hot In It,” which, much like “The Motto,” is an instant earworm.
It’s hot, innit.
The “Track 10” titan actually first teased the track on her TikTok all the way back in May. Granted, given that the final version is just slightly more than two minutes long, that TikTok teaser was more or less…the song in its entirety.
Yes, streaming services, Billboard chart rule changes and TikTok all ruined song lengths. Yes, it sucks (at times), but it’s also increasingly the New Normal. Better to just accept it now than to become the old man yelling on my lawn about how, back in my day, songs lasted 3:30 minimum, and we liked it. (Not all new song lengths are breaking my soul, anyway.)
“I was so honored when I got the call, to be honest, because I feel like we’ve been in each other’s ether for many, many years and nothing’s ever quite happened, but I’m so happy that we waited for this song because it truly is an anthem. And every single one of my friends, my friends from back home in Essex, my edgy, cool friends in LA, all ends of the spectrum, my mom, everybody wants to just party to this song. It’s back to my roots. It’s me saying, ‘in it’ on a track. Extremely referential. It’s huge,” Charli explained to Zane Lowe on Apple 1.
“I feel like my preferred style of singing is something that’s like a little more rhythmic, that feels like it could be a part of the track anyway. So when Tiësto sent me this original idea where like the “hot in it” element was in there, it felt very me. I was in Houston on tour. and I went to a studio there and I wrote my parts, and it was the first time that I sang it out loud. It just all fit together so well. And when I was going back to the venue, I just made the Uber driver drive around Houston and just play it on repeat. The Uber driver was into it. He was like, ‘Hey, I think this is going to be big.’ And I was like, ‘Thanks.'”
That Uber driver made points, Charli: it’s going to be big. Should it have come out before Pride Month? Probably, yes. But still.
i think what you’re trying to say is “voice of a generation” https://t.co/s1r5juznpv
— Charli (@charli_xcx) June 30, 2022
Is it her peak, lyrically speaking? Of course, yes, it is. Voice of a generation, indeed.
In all seriousness, though: sell the fuck out Charli, baby! For real! We all know that she can cut deep musically whenever she wants. There’s nothing to prove when it comes to her artistic ability. Who says she can’t be an influential alt-pop pioneer while simultaneously having some good ol’ drink-spilling, ass-shaking, local-friendly club fun for the summer?
Charli’s proven herself to be quite a #vers queen over the years: she can go super experimental, left-lane artsy-fartsy, she can pen Top 40 radio mainstream hits for other pop superstars, and she can do big, dumb EDM party anthems. This one falls into the latter category, along with “Out Out” with Joel Corry and Jax Jones, which remains her most popular track on Spotify. And, with any luck, this is surely going to sail right up there to the top, too.
For an artist who’s always operated just outside of the mainstream, it feels like the right move towards total XCX World domination.
