Charli XCX wants to collab with Rebecca Black & Grimes for quarantine album

Earlier this week (April 7), Charli XCX announced that she was going to release a self-isolation album, titled how i’m feeling now. Slated for release on May 15, the singer says the record will be “very DIY”, as she only has limited tools at her fingertips while she quarantines amid the coronavirus crisis. Now, in a Zoom chat, Charli has given more details about the forthcoming record.

Yesterday (April 8) evening, Dazed joined Rebecca Black, Maisie Williams, BRICKS magazine editor (and undercover Brexit babe) Tori West, comedian Jaboukie, as well as journalists and stans to discuss what Charli’s been doing in isolation, who she wants to collab with, and what else we can expect from how i’m feeling now.

Here’s everything we learned.

THE ALBUM’S FIRST TRACK IS OUT TODAY

After the Zoom chat ended last night, Charli revealed the chosen artwork for how i’m feeling now’s first single, “forever”, and announced that the song would drop today. The singer previously shared an instrumental clip of the single on Twitter, along with a visual showing snippets of her recent life in quarantine. Later that day (April 7), Charli went live on Instagram to play fans a demo of “forever”. Watch out for the track dropping later today.

SHE WANTS TO COLLAB WITH REBECCA BLACK, GRIMES, AND MORE

Referencing Dazed’s recent Instagram Live in which Black said she would like to collaborate with Charli, the musician told the “Friday” singer: “I just want to say that when I read that, I freaked out and it made me so happy.” Black later said that during quarantine, she’s been doing a lot of Zoom sessions with writers and producers, but told Charli: “If you ever need a bitch on a song…” The singer replied: “I love that! We should definitely talk about that.” 

Charli also said she wants to collaborate with musical artists who are also very visual, mentioning Grimes and Caroline Polachek. “That would be really exciting because I’m very much inspired by the way that they communicate their own projects and visual aesthetics,” Charli said. “I think it’s really considered and detailed – they really care about that aspect of what they do.” Alluding to the greatest collab ever, the musician added: “I’d also love to see what kind of artwork Paris Hilton might make for me. That would be really fun.”

THE ARTWORK WILL BE MADE BY FANS

Speaking on Zoom, Charli said that she wants to create three pieces of artwork for each track she releases before the album drops. For every cover, she wants to collaborate with fans, artists, or “people who I feel can connect with my work” and have them “interpret the image that I select in whichever way they wish to, and in whatever medium they want”. She added: “At the end of the project, I’d love to auction each artwork as an individual piece and raise some money for charity. I would also love to be able to make some kind of visual book surrounding the entire album – it would be really special to collect all of these artworks together as one project.”

SHE WAS MEANT TO RELEASE A JANET JACKSON-ESQUE ALBUM IN SEPTEMBER

Charli previously said she wanted to release two albums in 2020, following last year’s Charli, which featured a number of incredible collabs, including Christine and the Queens, Sky Ferreira, Troye Sivan, and too many more to mention. Speaking on Zoom, Charli revealed that the coronavirus pandemic made her change her mind about her double album plans. “My original plan this year was that I would release an album in September,” the singer said, “then another one in December.” Charli said that because she hadn’t started making the second record yet, that she would instead “transfer whatever that album was to now”, but explained that she’d been working on the first album since January. “That will come after this album, and it’s kind of inspired by Janet Jackson.” So, good news for fans: there’s still two new records to look forward to.

LIKE THE REST OF US, SHE’S GOTTEN REALLY INTO BAKING

If you’ve scrolled through Instagram lately, you’ll have seen that everyone is baking – now, even Charli XCX says she’s getting in on the action. “We’ve done carrot cake,” the singer told Dazed’s editor, Anna Cafolla, “and today we’re going to try banana bread.” Charli is quarantining with her boyfriend and two friends who are also her managers. “We’re cooking, we’re doing puzzles – it feels very wholesome.” Now on her fourth week of isolation, Charli said she’s actually “really enjoying it”, adding: “The first couple of weeks, I wasn’t really doing anything, and it felt so nice to relax and be present. I think that’s something that the human race will benefit from. I’d be interested to see how it affects us when we come out of isolation.”

Read Charli XCX’s quarantine diary exclusively on Dazed here.