Charli XCX has revealed that she “never really felt accepted” in the British music scene during the early years of her career.

As she gears up to release her sixth studio album ‘Brat’, the singer – real name Charlotte Aitchison – said that she had been treated as an “outsider” in the business, and her ideas dismissed as “silly or childish”.

“The industry’s changed a lot. I’ve been told for so long that I’m an outsider and I never really felt accepted into the British music scene,” she told The Observer. 

“The press has perpetuated that narrative of me. I’m this girl who straddles the underground and pop music, and that, for some reason, is really difficult for some people to wrap their heads around.”

Aitchison did find more of a home, however, on the label PC Music, whose founder A.G. Cook has been a regular producer of her work since the 2017 mixtape ‘Number 1 Angel’. The label revealed last year that it would cease issuing new music following its 2023 releases.

She continued: “Any collaborators I’d worked with had at points thought of my ideas as silly or childish, or not eloquent. It took some people who were willing to think quite drastically outside the box to make those ideas reality, and that was what I found in PC Music.”

Nonetheless, Aitchinson added that she believed times have changed. “More than ever now, people are rewarding the niche,” she said. “Finally, it seems fine that I’m just myself, and suddenly people like it. It’s good to finally be accepted. I’m happy with the winding path I’ve taken, and with my status as more of an outsider, because sometimes I feel a bit awkward being in the club. I’m at peace with it all. It’s all cool.”

‘Brat’ will be released on June 7 (pre-order/pre-save here) and features songs including ‘Von Dutch’, ‘360’, ‘Club Classics’ and ‘B2B’.

Aitchinson also played the album track ‘Everything Is Romantic’ for the first time during her show at Primavera Sound last night (June 1) in Barcelona, Spain.