Charli XCX and Taylor Swift may be the ultimate pop star duo that need to “work it out on the remix.” Fans have been pitting them against one another since Charli’s album Brat was released in June 2024, but the singers actually go way back.
Keep reading for a complete timeline of their relationship.
2018
Charli opened for Taylor during her Reputation tour, sometimes joining her on stage to help her perform “Shake It Off.” The following year, the British singer told Pitchfork, “As an artist, it kind of felt like I was getting up onstage and waving to 5-year-olds.”
The comment later had her putting out an apology to Swifties.
Early 2023
Taylor briefly dated The 1975 lead singer Matty Healy from April to June. During this time, Charli was also dating her now-fiancé George Daniel, The 1975’s drummer. We can imagine the two songstresses had several run-ins during this time.
May 2024
In May 2023, Charli put out a “brat psa” on TikTok, where she told fans there are no “diss tracks” on the album.
“It’s so complicated,” she explained in the PSA, being “a female artist, where you are pitted against your peers but also expected to be best friends with every single person constantly. If you’re not, you’re deemed a bad feminist.”
June 2024
Charli dropped Brat, including the song “Sympathy is a knife,” which many fans have speculated to be about Taylor.
The song reveals the British singer’s insecurities about “this one girl” and her complicated feelings towards her (“I couldn’t even be her if I tried”).
Charli also shares not wanting to see this woman at her “boyfriend’s show,” seemingly hinting at The 1975. “Don’t wanna see her backstage at my boyfriend’s show / Fingers crossed behind my back, I hope they break up quick,” she sings.
Eventually, the two actually did fight it out on the charts. As Brat was poised to take the No. 1 spot in the U.K. charts, Taylor dropped a surprise rerelease of The Tortured Poets Department, which nabbed the position instead.
Shortly after, while at a DJ set in São Paulo, Charli’s fans began chanting “Taylor is dead!” in Portuguese, prompting the singer to post an Instagram Story: “Can the people who do this please stop. Online or at my shows. It is the opposite of what I want and it disturbs me that anyone would think there is room for this in this community. I will not tolerate it.”
August 2024
“People are gonna think what they want to think,” Charli told Vulture. “That song [‘Sympathy is a knife’] is about me and my feelings and my anxiety and the way my brain creates narratives and stories in my head when I feel insecure and how I don’t want to be in those situations physically when I feel self-doubt.”
For her part, Taylor had nothing but kind words to say about Charli during an August 2024 feature in New York Magazine.
“I’ve been blown away by Charli’s melodic sensibilities since I first heard ‘Stay Away’ in 2011,” she told the outlet. “Her writing is surreal and inventive, always. She just takes a song to places you wouldn’t expect it to go, and she’s been doing it consistently for over a decade. I love to see hard work like that pay off.”
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