Pop
Charli xcx on giving back to the queer community: 'It's really important to me'
Charli xcx says she owes her career to the queer community, crediting LGBTQ+ fans for shaping her artistry and supporting her long before Brat made her a mainstream force.
Charli xcx has reiterated that she owes her career to the queer community.
Long before Brat pushed her into the mainstream in 2024, the pop star was lifted up by a fiercely loyal LGBTQ+ fanbase - a support system she still leans on today. She also drew huge creative strength from the late electronic trailblazer SOPHIE, who was transgender, and has made a point of giving back to the community at every opportunity.
At the weekend, the Rock Music singer headlined National PrEP Day, launched by telehealth platform MISTR to help get complimentary and low‑fee HIV prevention to those in need.
Speaking at the event in West Hollywood, Charli - who partied with the likes of Kim Petras, Kesha, Demi Lovato and Khloé Kardashian at the bash - told Newsweek: “I would not be the artist I am without the queer community.
“When the rest of the music industry didn't really get or understand my vision, the queer community did, and they uplifted me and made me feel comfortable in who I am, not only as an artist, but a person. And so anything that I can do to sort of give back in any kind of way is just really important to me.”
It's not the first time she has thanked the LBGTQ+ community for the making of her pop career.
In a 2019 interview with Australian website MusicFeeds, she said: "I feel the love from that community has made me feel confident in myself, and I feel that they have shown me how they express themselves every day. How they're so powerful and individual and unique and resilient and it's made me feel confident to open up and be the artist I am now. I feel so thankful and I feel safe.
"Without that love from them, I wouldn't be where I am. 'Charli' wouldn't exist. They've given me a home in pop music."
Explaining that she has felt as though the LGBTQ community has been behind her music since the release of her 2016 EP Vroom Vroom, she added: "It kind of began with 'Vroom Vroom', but when I started putting the mixtapes out that's when I started to really feel it. It changed so much. It made me feel like I would always have a home. They get me, and I get them. We've got our own thing going on. Sometimes it feels like it is us against the world, it's okay because we have each other."
