Charli XCX electrifies Reading Festival with era-spanning headline set

At Reading Festival on a rain-soaked August night, Charli XCX stood at the intersection of who she has been and who she is becoming — offering tens of thousands of people a two-hour meditation on artistic reinvention. Her headline set moved deliberately between the electronic euphoria that made Brat a cultural landmark and the guitar-edged distortion of her new album Music, Fashion, Film, closing not with triumph but with a filmmaker's words about oblivion and freedom. It was a reminder that the most enduring performances are not celebrations of arrival, but honest reckonings with change.