Charli XCX absolutely blew fans away on the opening night of her Music, Fashion, Film tour. Kicking off in Philadelphia, fans were in for an experience. The show was scheduled to start at 8 p.m., but opener Underscores started 10 minutes early, beginning her set at 7:50 p.m. She was a perfect choice to open this tour; her music is similar to SOPHIE, who Charli gets a lot of her creative inspiration from. She set an amazing tone for Charli’s set.
With an 11-song setlist, Underscores wrapped up around 8:25 p.m. She played songs like “Unlimited Love,” her set opener, “Innuendo,” and “Music,” her set closer. Charli then promptly started her set at 9:10 p.m., leaving about a 45-minute gap between acts. That 45 minutes is truly needed for the elaborate stage setup this tour includes.
The stage is a square of triangles with a large speaker at the top, behind the top square. This allows for intricate choreography to occur, with the stage setup including multiple doors built into the structure. Charli opened the show with her album’s lead single, “Rock Music.” Clips and flashing lights appeared on the screens, followed by fire and a track of David Cronenberg saying “Oblivion is Freedom” a few times before her band emerged from the second floor of the stage, where Charli was standing with a mic, waiting for them. “Rock Music” then transitioned into “Yeah.”
The packed 29-song setlist featured one live debut: the song “Persona” off of “Music, Fashion, Film.” My personal favorite song to hear live off the new album was “I’m Afraid,” a deeply personal and relatable track for Charli. However, my general overall favorite was a tough tie between “Sympathy Is A Knife” and “Von Dutch.”
The songs from “Music, Fashion, Film” were guitar and drum-heavy, giving the concert elements of a rock show, but it also had club vibes with songs from “Brat” and “how i’m feeling now.” One song that I was intrigued about how the tour concept was going to include was “House” from the “Wuthering Heights” soundtrack, which ended up being one of the coolest performances of the entire set. During the spoken-word intro, a spotlight slowly came down to hit Charli on the stage when she said, “I think I’m gonna die in this house.” Overall, it was amazing to see that song come to life on stage. She also played “Die For You” off the “Wuthering Heights” soundtrack.
However, as Charli has a large discography, she chose to include surprise songs at every show. For opening night, she wanted to throw it back to the first song she ever released, “Stay Away” off of her 2013 album, “True Romance,” which left many fans pleasantly shocked. Another fun element to the show is Charli bringing Underscores back out to perform her song “Do It” as a duet.
Another standout part of the set is during “Guess,” when Charli launches underwear out into the crowd like confetti, just like in the music video with Billie Eilish. It will be interesting to see if she brings Eilish out as a special guest at any of her shows on this tour.
Charli’s set is about an hour and 35 minutes long, wrapping up with “No One Lasts Forever.” The show ended the same way it started, with the spoken word from David Cronenberg saying “Oblivion is Freedom,” but this included the words popping up on the screen to close out the night.
This concert was truly rock mixed with the club, and a highly visual show with many strobe lights and pyro. The only complaint I noticed among fans was the merch. Many people complained the price wasn’t worth the quality of what you got. Fans were especially annoyed by how some of “the merch looked scribbled on.” However, Kesha did the same thing with some of her merch this past tour, and people praised it, so the backlash against Charli’s feels like a complete double standard. Overall, this tour was amazing to watch, especially on opening night, and it appears to be well received by fans so far; the progression throughout the tour will be interesting to see.
