CHARLI XCX rolled into Reading Festival and used her headline slot to launch the next phase of her pop life — with a set that hopped between the rock edge of Music, Fashion, Film and the electronic rush of Brat.

It was her first UK festival performance since releasing Music, Fashion, Film, the follow-up that shifts away from Brat’s culture-bending electronic-pop into something sharper and more guitar-led. Friday night proved she’s not ditching either side of herself, though: new material sat comfortably next to fan favourites from across her back catalogue.

The show also came with a noticeable upgrade in scale. Charli boosted the staging compared with her last Brat tour, cycling through numerous costume changes while backed by dancers and a live band.

She opened with distorted black-and-white video projections of herself, then kicked straight into Rock Music as tens of thousands at the main stage erupted when the chords hit. New tracks Wink Wink, Yeah and Card Declined followed, before she swapped a black sparkly blazer for a black corseted dress.

The middle stretch swung from pop hit Track 10 from her 2017 mixtape to House, a more melancholy song she co-wrote for the recent Wuthering Heights soundtrack album. Later, she fed the dance cravings with Club Classics, 365 and the Grammy-winning Von Dutch from Brat — the sixth album that became a cultural phenomenon and propelled her to new heights in 2024.

Charli closed by returning to Music, Fashion, Film, finishing on No One Lasts Forever — ending with filmmaker David Cronenberg’s voice saying “no one lasts forever” and “oblivion is freedom” as she stared across the crowd, surrounded by her dancers.