PLUGIN WEEK 2026: Charli XCX has managed to carve out a highly successful career by treading a fine line between commercial pop and more edgy contemporary styles.
Her music has been heavily influenced by genres such as electroclash and hyperpop and although she works alongside producers from these genres such as A. G. Cook, Sophie Xeon and Finn Keane, she clearly also has a strong vision for how she wants to sound.
On her latest album Music, Fashion, Film she shifts gear yet again towards more rock territory - though inevitably with a twist. Here we’re going to focus on a couple of central aspects of her sound and show you how to create something similar using straightforward plugins.
1. Heavy vocal processing
Step 1. Focused word-specific or phrase-specific vocal processing of all kinds is a recurring theme in Charli XCX’s tracks. The most obvious is pitch correction, often set very fast on specific phrases or words. Check out the track Party 4 U on the album How I’m Feeling Now (YouTube video above) for multiple examples.
Nevertheless, an important starting point is to separate out words and phrases that you think can be processed independently. Here we’ve started moving some parts onto separate tracks ready for processing.
Step 2. Pitch correction is a classic effect that Charli uses in both extreme and obvious ways, often with no attempt to disguise it - listen to the Brat track I Might Say Something Stupid for an example.
The classic extreme effect works best when it quickly bends an existing pitch change in the vocal. So, to get the most obvious effect choose a word or short phrase that already has a note move.
The effect is often best achieved using real time processors, and you need to set the correction speed to its maximum. For the most accurate behaviour specify scale and key of the track, or even select just the notes you want, as we have here.
Step 3. A further technique and something you’ll hear on Charli tracks is artificially shifting of formants. Check out Everything Is Romantic on Brat. You can use this to make vocals sound younger or older without changing the pitch, and it works well as a spot effect on individual words or for harmonies and backing vocals.
Here we’re using Melodyne to process a short phrase. We are shifting up by about 500 cents. You can see the graphic shows the formants set above the pitch of the audio, which remains at its original pitch.
Step 4. You can layer a higher or often lower octave of a vocal manually by simply recording an additional version. Check out various sections on Vroom Vroom. But if you want a more ‘effected’ outcome you can also do this using a plugin.
Here once again we’re using Melodyne, which allows us to do this very easily, and we’ve used the main vocal double track as our source audio, shifting it up 12 semitones.
Step 5. On her latest single releases SS26 and Rock Music, the pitch correction might be less obvious, but the extreme vocal processing is still in full effect. Check out the stutter effect on Rock Music. You can achieve this by looping a section of audio in your DAW, but a Stutter plugin may be more fun. Here we’ve used Air Stutter to try out different timings on the fly.
Step 6. Finally, a great sound when used carefully is a vocoder. On Charli’s track Party 4 U there’s already a lot of pitch correction and formant shifting. The vocoder part gradually adds a further pad and vocal-like effect, and this fits the track perfectly.
Here we’ve separated part of our answer vocal onto a separate track and then used it as the modulator for a vocoder instrument. The vocoder has various onboard carrier synth sounds, which is sound you’ll hear but modulated by the original vocal.
Choose something sparkly for an ethereal effect and then program a MIDI part much like you would for a chordal pad section.
2. Simple but effective beats
![Charli XCX - Vroom Vroom [Official Video] - YouTube](https://img.youtube.com/vi/qfAqtFuGjWM/maxresdefault.jpg)
Step 1. Despite shifting between various different genres, Charli’s music has one consistent theme when it comes to drum beats - simplicity. What this means in practice is drum parts are often no more than 3 components - kick, snare/clap and hi-hats.
Fills, if used at all, are basic. The skill really lies in picking and fine tuning the sounds and working on the programming. By removing elements of the beat in different sections of the song and then adding them back in, it’s possible to create the minimalist beats key to many Charli XCX tracks.
Step 2. Although simple, Charli beats add interest with additional processing. Let’s take a look at a few ideas. First up, look for ways to make common sounds such as classic Roland kicks and snares more individual. Check out the backbeat on Vroom Vroom or Party 4 U for example.
Rather than trawl through samples, use saturation or bitcrushing to create your own individual lo-fi sounds. Here we’re processing an 808 snare using multiband bitcrushing and some EQ.
Step 3. Next up, the pitched 808. This appears in plenty of Charli productions. The tracks Claws from How I’m Feeling Now and 360 from Brat are just a couple of examples. You can create the basic sound on most synths using two sine wave oscillators.
The second one should be set an octave below and could be a sub oscillator if you have that option.
Focus on balancing the two oscillators and tailoring the amplitude envelope, using the decay to create a ‘one shot’ style outcome. Add a low pass filter and apply the same kind of envelope shape to that. Finally, if you want to add a bit of grit use a saturation plugin or blend in a third square wave oscillator as we’ve done here.
Step 4. Finally, try using reverb selectively on your drums to differentiate sections of the track. Check out the track Out Of My Head on POP 2 or Symphony Is a Knife from Brat. Here reverb on the clap back beat changes for different sections of the track.
To achieve this you can either set up a task specific insert reverb at the end of your channel strip, or use an auxiliary. In either case, use DAW automation to add the reverb selectively. Here we’ve simply automated the auxiliary send for the chorus section.
