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brat summer

This weekend brought the offical end of brat summer, and Charli XCX is now a week into her 21-city North America arena tour with Troye Sivan. So how much was brat summer worth?
While it’s impossible to know how much Charli made in total from the groundswell around brat, a colorful concept built on spontaneity and living life to its fullest, we crunched the numbers around a few brat summer deals. According to our rough estimate, these deals — specifically her cut of the ticket sales revenue from her co-headlined Sweat tour and other shows, earnings from the revenue generated by her catalog and songwriter share royalties this year, and the H&M ad campaign deal — netted Charli around $9.62 million so far this year.

Brat, Charli XCX’s sixth album, which debuted at No. 3 on the June 7-dated Billboard 200, is the long-time London rave singer’s most commercially successful album by far. Its lime green album art, Charli’s candid, sometimes vulnerable lyrics, and the open-ended conversation about what it means to be “brat” resonated with audiences, putting Charli at the center of the cultural conversation with everyone from Vice President Kamala Harris’s campaign for U.S. president to a vegan sausage company embracing “brat” culture.

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“She has got the attention of anybody that she wants right now,” says Jenna Adler, Charli’s agent at CAA. The album’s 23 tracks (including remixes) passed the more-than 1 billion streams mark on Spotify in late August, and, according to Luminate, her catalog has racked up around 2 billion on-demand streams globally. Charli announced brand partnerships with H&M and Skims, and her first North America arena tour with Sivan sold out shows in Boston, Chicago, New York and San Francisco immediately.

Touring

The momentum that built over brat summer helped the pair of Charli XCX and Sivan sell more than 97%, or 261,694 of 269,733, of the total tickets available for their Sweat tour, Adler says.

With an average ticket price of around $90, Billboard estimates the tour has grossed roughly $23.5 million. After touring’s various costs, including the artist manager’s fee, touring artists usually take home around 34% of ticket sales, or in this case about $8 million. If it is a co-headline tour, that would likely be split 50/50, with Charli earning $4 million.

To build excitement ahead of the arena tour, Charli headlined a handful of sold-out shows branded Charli XCX Presents: PARTYGIRL shows, that were intentionally small to allow fans to feel part of a Charli XCX-DJ’d dance party, Adler says.

Three of those shows — held in London, Los Angeles and Sao Paulo in June — grossed $377,300 from a combined total of 7,413 tickets sold, according to figures reported to Billboard Boxscore. Billboard does not have data on two additional shows Charli headlined in Brooklyn and Chicago, and our calculations do not include Charli XCX’s many festival performances this year or revenue from merch sold at concerts — an area of touring that can be quite lucrative.

The Sweat tour marks the first time either Charli or Sivan will headline arenas in the world’s biggest music market, and tickets went on sale to the public on April 26. Roughly 70% were sold by the end of May, rising to 80% by mid-June and over 90% by the end of July, Billboard reported.

Total estimated touring income (for 3 party girl shows and Sweat tour): $4.1 million

Streaming

Kamala Harris’s campaign for president leaned into brat summer on July 21, the day President Joe Biden dropped out of the 2024 presidential race and endorsed Harris. Charli XCX posted on X (formerly Twitter) “kamala IS brat,” Harris’s campaign briefly adopted brat’s lime-green hue on social platforms, and the week of the 2024 Democratic National Convention, from Aug. 19 through Aug. 25, it was the sole sponsor of Spotify’s official “This is Charli XCX” playlist.

While Charli did not directly benefit from the sponsorship—the Harris/Walz campaign paid Spotify an undisclosed amount—the popular playlist with 2 ½ hours of her most popular songs got a boost in listeners and followers.

Roughly 127,000 Spotify users follow — or have saved — the Spotify playlist, which gained 12,400 new followers between Aug. 10 and Sept. 10, with around 5,000 users piling on during the Harris campaign’s sponsorship, according to Chartmetric.

Spotify monthly listeners of the playlist rose by 8.6 million, or 23.4%, to 45.5 million between Aug. 12 and Aug. 27. Listenership declined slightly during the three days that led up to Aug. 19, the first day of the DNC convention, but that trend reversed with the biggest single day boost occurring on Aug. 20. By Aug. 28, brat’s 23 official tracks, remixes and bonus tracks had nearly 1.08 billion streams on Spotify, Chartmetric says.

Globally, Charli XCX’s catalog has accumulated nearly 2 billion on-demand streams, according to Luminate. So far this year, her recorded music catalog has generated 722,000 album consumption units in the United States, as of Sept. 9, compared to an average of 216,000 album consumption units from 2021-2024, according to Luminate. Her songs have generated 781.13 million on-demand streams in the U.S. this year, primarily from audio on-demand streams. Programmed streams topped 10.73 million or double her three-year average.

That translates to nearly $6 million in revenue for her U.S. label and $13.4 million globally so far this year, based on Billboard estimates which were calculated by using RIAA U.S. data to determine wholesale rates, and per-stream rates provided by financial sources at major and indie labels. If Charli XCX gets traditional superstar royalties of 22% for “sale” formats like CDs, vinyl and downloads; and a 37% rate for on-demand streaming, Billboard estimates her take-home pay so far this year, minus the traditional 4% producer’s fee, would be nearly $4.1 million.

Charli’s master recordings have produced $1.52 million in royalty revenues for the publishers of the songwriters she has used and nearly $3.5 million in publishing royalties when extrapolating for global publishing revenue, according to Billboard’s estimates.

Billboard estimates Charli XCX has a 30% songwriter share for the songs on her album, which means her publisher would realize roughly $1.05 million for her catalog’s global activity so far this year. If Charli has a traditional 50/50 publishing revenue split deal, she would receive $525,000; if she signed a co-publishing 75/25 deal, she would net about $788,000; and if she owns her publishing royalties and has signed an administration deal, which can run from 85/15 to 94/6 with as much as 94% of the publishing revenue going to the songwriter and 6% going to the administrator, she could net as much as $922,000. (Calculations are based on a typical 88% administration rate.)

Total estimated streaming, catalog and publishing income: max $5.02 million.

Brand Deals

In the past month, Kim Kardashian’s SKIMS and H&M have both launched campaigns featuring Charli XCX. The SKIMS campaign, launched Aug. 21, has Charli modeling its new cotton collection of boxers, bralettes and fleece pants. For H&M, Charli stars alongside other culture shifters Arca, Lila Moss, Ajus Samuel, Loli Bahia, Wali Deutsch and others in the global retailer’s A/W 2024 campaign. Financial details of these deals are not public, but sources estimate Charli was paid a sum in the mid-six-figures for her deal with H&M.

Billboard has reported in the past that branding deals contribute $2.6 billion in revenue annually to the music industry, with sponsorship spending on music tours, venues and festivals comprising more than 60% of that amount. The remainder comes from fees paid for the use of music in ads, films, games and TV shows, with endorsement payments, such as clothing brand partnerships, contributing the smallest portion of revenue.

Marcie Allen, the MAC (Marcie Allen Consulting) president known for orchestrating some of the highest-profile brand partnerships in the music industry, says these kinds of deals, and what it takes to land them, are rarely about the money.

To attract attention from top companies serving the Gen Z market, “it isn’t just about awareness, recognition or buzz. It is about puncturing through culture to create an entire subculture, a new vernacular, and ultimately becoming embedded into identity.”

“The concept of ‘going viral’ is fundamentally changing and Charli XCX’s ‘brat summer’ is a perfect example.”

Additional reporting by Ed Christman and Eric Frankenberg

This is the first of a new column Billboard is launching in which we will unpack one financial issue a week for an artist in the news. Thanks for reading, and if you have suggestions or tips, email me at ediltsmarshall@billboard.com.

Chappell Roan’s The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess and Charli XCX’s Brat reach new highs on Billboard’s Top Streaming Albums chart (dated Aug. 17) as the sets climb 4-3 and 10-5, respectively. Both titles also post new one-week highs in streaming-equivalent album units earned, as well their biggest streaming weeks.
Meanwhile, Morgan Wallen’s One Thing at a Time logs an eighth non-consecutive week atop the tally, and Ye (formerly Kanye West) and Ty Dolla $ign’s Vultures 2 flies in at No. 6 as the only debut in the top 10.

The 50-position Top Streaming Albums chart ranks the most-streamed albums of the week in the U.S., as compiled by Luminate. Titles are ranked by streaming equivalent album (SEA) units, where each SEA unit equals 3,750 ad-supported or 1,250 paid/subscription on-demand official audio and video streams generated by songs from an album. If an artist has multiple albums containing the same song, SEA units for that song are generally assigned to whichever album sells the most by traditional album sales in a given week.

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One Thing at a Time holds at No. 1 on Top Streaming Albums with 60,500 SEA units (down 3%; equaling 83.11 million on-demand official streams of the set’s songs). Taylor Swift’s The Tortured Poets Department bumps 3-2 with 57,500 units (down 3%; 75.43 million on-demand official streams of its songs); it previously spent 11 total and consecutive weeks at No. 1 (May 4-July 13-dated charts).

Roan’s The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess steps 4-3 with 55,000 SEA units (up 18%, equaling 72.66 million official on-demand streams of its songs), hitting a new peak. It’s the best week, by SEA units and on-demand streams, for the album. The set, which debuted on the tally dated April 27 at No. 34, has been bumping around the Nos. 4-6 positions on the chart in the last six weeks.

Roan has four songs – three from Midwest Princess – on the latest Streaming Songs chart (dated Aug. 17), and all four hit new peaks. The three Midwest tracks gaining new ground are “Hot To Go!” (22-14), “Pink Pony Club” (31-21) and “Red Wine Supernova” (43-32). Meanwhile, the non-album cut “Good Luck, Babe!” climbs 5-4.

Zach Bryan’s former Top Streaming Albums leader The Great American Bar Scene falls 2-4 with 50,000 SEA units (down 16%; equaling 65.53 million on-demand official streams of the set’s songs).

Charli XCX’s Brat bounces 10-5 with 49,500 SEA units (up 49%; equaling 65.17 million on-demand official streams of the set’s songs). It’s the best week, by SEA units and on-demand streams, for the album. The set surges following the Aug. 1 release of the “Guess” remix, featuring Billie Eilish. “Guess” was originally issued as a solo Charli XCX cut on the deluxe edition of the Brat album. Eilish was added to a new remix on Aug. 1. All versions of the song are combined for charting purposes, and contribute to the Brat album’s SEA total.

Three Brat tunes are on the Top Streaming Albums chart: “Guess,” which debuts at No. 6, “Apple,” new at No. 39 (continuing to bask in its gone-viral dance trend), and “360” (38-41).

The lone debut in the top 10 of the new Top Streaming Albums chart is Ye and Ty Dolla $ign’s Vultures 2, at No. 6 with nearly 46,000 SEA units (59.44 million on-demand official streams of the 16 songs on the streaming edition of the album).

In an era when most albums peak in interest during their debut week and slowly slide away from there, Charli XCX‘s Brat is already two months old and still seems to become more central to the pop conversation every week.

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As two of the album’s established hits continue to climb the Billboard Hot 100 this week, with “360” climbing 44-41 and “Apple” rising 66-52, the two songs are leapfrogged by the No. 12 debut of “Guess,” boosted by the Brat bonus cut’s new remix featuring pop superstar Billie Eilish. The flirty collab between the two pop hitmakers (with an eye-catching, undergarment-strewn video) instantly becomes Charli XCX’s highest-peaking single since 2014, while Eilish collects her sixth new top 20 hit this year.

What does the song’s success mean for the rest of the pop season increasingly referred to as Brat summer? And how important are the song’s sapphic overtones (particularly in Eilish’s new verse) to the continued normalization of LGBTQ content in top 40? Billboard staffers discuss these questions and more below.

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1. Charli XCX’s Billie Eilish-featuring remix of Brat deluxe reissue cut “Guess” debuts at No. 12 on the Hot 100 this week — making it easily the highest-peaking hit from the entire Brat era. Is its success just a matter of the combined star power of the names involved, or do you think there’s more to the song’s success?

Katie Bain: Certainly it’s a function of the star power, plus a general curiosity of what Billie would bring to the song, then also an acknowledgment of how well she delivers on the track. It seems likely as well that timing is a factor, given that the remix came out 10 days after Charli’s culture-sharking “Kamala IS brat’ tweet whipped up a frenzy and pushed the album further into the cultural conversation, particularly areas where it didn’t previously exist, drawing more attention to anything/everything about the project. The song’s female-centric themes also dovetail neatly with the woman-power vibe of the Kamala Harris campaign (albeit in a much more explicit way), so the remix coming in the wake of the tweet made for synergy, and likely made a difference in the track’s performance.

Stephen Daw: I’d argue it’s more the latter. There’s no denying that nabbing a mega-star like Billie Eilish for the “Guess” remix was a huge get for Charli, but the reason this remix works is because it feels like a missing piece of the song has been added. Instead of simply repeating the same verse, Billie gets her own take on the track with some truly out of pocket lyrics that add to the performative idea behind the single. Sure, having these two stars together on one track certainly contributed to the song’s success, but I doubt it would have charted this high were it not for Billie’s cheeky performance.

Jason Lipshutz: The star power helps — after all, Billie Eilish is one of the biggest active pop superstars on the planet, with another smash currently in the top 10 of the Hot 100 — but the “Guess” remix has largely benefited from the general buy-in to the Brat era and the narrative that Charli XCX has harnessed with the project. Brat has become the definition of cool in pop over the past few months, and because of that, its deluxe-edition songs, remixes and music videos have all enjoyed the snowball effect of Brat Summer, with each new release receiving greater and greater attention from a larger number of listeners. For her part, Charli has played this rollout perfectly — including saving her biggest remix collaborator for the moment in which Brat consumption reached a fever pitch.

Taylor Mims: Combined star power is definitely a factor in the song’s success. Both Charli and Billie are having huge summers with two great albums, but throwing two big stars on a track doesn’t necessarily make a hit. Billie has been a superstar for years now, but Hit Me Hard and Soft shows off her different, lighter side with tracks like “Lunch,” “Birds of a Feather” and “L’Amour De Ma Vie.” A track like “Guess,” which ends with the line “You wanna guess if I’m serious about this song,” is so unserious in the best way possible — and makes it a perfect companion for Billie’s current repertoire, which makes it easy for her fans to get on board.  

Andrew Unterberger: It’s a combination of a star power 1-2 and just good planning in general: Everything about the rollout, timing and general conceptualization behind the “Guess” remix hit just right. Personally I think there’s plenty of other Bratverse songs that deserve to be as big (and likely bigger), but the major debut of “Guess” is sort of the culmination of the entire era to this point anyway.

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2. As Brat summer just keeps getting hotter, the album continues to climb back up the Billboard 200, now ranking at No. 6 — three spots off its No. 3 debut a couple months ago. Do you think it will eventually best that original peak, or do you think the season of Brat is soon to wind to a close?

Katie Bain: It depends on what tricks Charli has up her sleeve to keep momentum going. She’s promised that a remix version of the album is coming, which would likely only draw more attention to the original, so depending on what her next chess moves are, I think there’s reason to believe it could continue climbing and segue us all into Brat Autumn. 

Stephen Daw: Every summer has to end, and that includes Brat summer. I could see the album gaining another position or two with another big, blockbuster remix (maybe with Troye Sivan ahead of their co-headlining Sweat Tour?), but I think we’re marching towards the end of the cultural chokehold Charli has held us in for the last few months.

Jason Lipshutz: Part of the answer will depend upon how much the Brat hits continue growing on the Hot 100; if Charli can score an enduring top 10 hit from the album, then the album has a good shot at rising back to, or above, its No. 3 peak. At this point, though, that battle has already been made moot by a successful war: Brat is now Charli xcx’s longest-running album on the Billboard 200 chart, and a full-blown cultural phenomenon that keeps getting bigger. Want to know what’s cooler than having a No. 1 album? Having one that helps define pop music for an entire season in 2024.

Taylor Mims: Just because school has resumed, does not mean we are done with Brat summer. The Democratic party candidate has been dubbed “Brat” and, if we are to make it through an election year in the U.S., we’re gonna need the Brat season to carry over into the fall. The allbum seems like it will easily regain its peak position and possibly even reach the summit following this “Guess” remix. Clocking in at under two and a half minutes, this song will get repeat listens at a rapid pace, and propel Brat further and further up the chart.

Andrew Unterberger: I wouldn’t bet against Brat‘s momentum at this point — it feels like she’s taking the Noah Kahan-minted approach to this album of continuing to crank out star-studded remixes and deluxe editions as long as fans have the appetite for ’em, and right now they still seem hungry as ever. Personally, I hope it peaks at No. 2 — marking an undeniable triumph, but still allowing Charli to hold onto a bit of her underdog edge.

3. Meanwhile, Eilish’s own “Birds of a Feather” keeps gaining momentum on the Hot 100 — reaching a new peak of No. 7 this week. Why do you think that song has grown into the biggest breakout hit from her Hit Me Hard and Soft album?

Katie Bain: Melody. Whereas a lot of the album is more challenging/experimental in terms of structure, themes and Billie’s vocal delivery, “Birds of a Feather” is a bright, straightforward, singalong pop song made for radio. 

Stephen Daw: “Birds of a Feather” feels like something genuinely new from an artist who has made a career from out-of-the-box creative decisions. The thing that makes “Birds” stand out in Billie’s catalog is that, sonically, it isn’t as eclectic as her other hits — it’s a simple, dark love song. It doesn’t lose that ephemeral quality that makes Billie Eilish songs so fascinating to listen to, but it also manages to recontextualize Billie in a more conventional sound that feels different from anything else she’s put out, let alone anything else on Hit Me Hard and Soft. Bonus points for the fact that her voice sounds nearly perfect on this track.

Jason Lipshutz: “Birds of a Feather” has maintained its high streaming totals while also establishing its foothold on pop radio, helping the song stay a hit in its first few weeks of release and then grow into an even bigger one recently. It also helps that “Birds” has the fans squarely in its corner: “Lunch” was the clear focus track upon the release of Hit Me Hard and Soft, but “Birds” quickly swooped in (pardon the pun) as the standout, and the early supporters are still listening to and championing the song three months later.

Taylor Mims: Obvious answer: because it’s a great song! Billie has historically had a much darker, moodier sound on her albums – plenty of which can still be found on HMAS – but “Birds of a Feather” is the opposite. The song is pure pop delight with her delicate vocals and the deeply sincere lyrics. The term “I want you to stay” could be dismissed as commonplace, but it’s actually an incredibly vulnerable thing to say to a new love and the lyrics only get better from there. It’s a phenomenally sweet love song that I think will only gain popularity the more it is played.

Andrew Unterberger: You know what pop fans still love, even in 2024? A good love song! You don’t hear as many on top 40 radio as you once did, of course — especially straightforward ones, written without much anger or resentment at their core — but when you hear a great singer testifying “I’ll love you ’til the day that I die” and sounding like they mean it, it’s still hugely powerful no matter who you are.

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4. The crossover success of “Guess,” in a summer that’s already seen songs of same-sex love and attraction from Chappell Roan and Eilish solo hit the top 10: very meaningful for LGBTQ presence and acceptance in pop music, somewhat meaningful, or not ultimately that meaningful?

Katie Bain: Representation is, as ever, important, especially when coming from two of the biggest pop stars on the planet who are at once celebrating and normalizing same sex love and attraction, and via Eilish, doing in a way that’s authentic/not performative. That feels meaningful. 

Stephen Daw: Without question, this is a Big Deal™ for the community. It’s not entirely new — Lil Nas X topped the charts back in 2021 with “Montero (Call Me By Your Name),” a song that is very loudly about queer sex. But what’s important about the success of “Guess,” “Lunch,”  “Good Luck, Babe!” and most of the other six songs Chappell currently has on the Hot 100 is consistency. Where past tracks about same-sex attraction could be written off as singular hits born out of a cult of personality, the continued success of all these songs about queer romance on the charts proves that audiences aren’t discriminatory when it comes to the object of a good love song — they care about specificity and whether or not it sounds good. That is a huge deal for every LGBTQ+ artist who has ever been told that they need to make their song more “universally appealing” (read: “less gay”), and a message to labels and distributors around the globe that these antiquated “rules” about what sells in pop music have been largely abandoned by modern audiences.

Jason Lipshutz: Very meaningful, just like all of these moments that help normalize same-sex feelings and relationships within popular music. Nothing about “Guess” is shocking in 2024, especially following recent hits by Chappell Roan and Eilish, but every song like it remains significant in rearranging the expectations of what a hit can express lyrically and musically. This year has been a landmark one for LGBTQ artists in the upper reaches of the charts, but more work needs to be done, and more songs like “Guess” means more positive developments. 

Taylor Mims: This is a very meaningful moment for LGBTQ+ representation in pop music, but especially for queer women. For centuries, women who love women have been disappeared from culture because of homophobia, for their own safety or simply because people didn’t think they were real. On top of that, there was the issue of “who their audience would be.” Gay men have long been a target audience for “divas” and pop stars, but Chappell and Billie (along with Renee Rapp, Janelle Monáe, boygenius and MUNA) have proven that queer women are an eager and powerful fanbase. And I much as I would like to believe that every person in those massive Chappell crowds identifies as LGBTQ+, I don’t think that’s the case — she is appealing to the widest of audiences.

Andrew Unterberger: I don’t know if it’s as meaningful as the other examples on the whole, but I think it’s particularly meaningful simply in its casting. If this was a decade ago, maybe Charli just enlists the guy from The Dare to be her leering co-star, and the results are fun but uninspiring. Instead, she keeps him behind the decks for “Guess” and allows her female peer to be the ogler — with much richer (and likely more successful) results. That’s a pretty big deal. Now the question is who on the hetero male side of pop hitmaking will be bold enough to do the same with a queer male star like Troye Sivan or Lil Nas X.

5. If you could flip the “Guess” batting order and have Charli XCX appear on a track from Hit Me Hard and Soft, which would you have her feature on?

Katie Bain: Given the hard left that “L’Amour de Ma Vie” takes at the 3:40 mark, it would create a huge sense of anticipation for Charli to show up on this last section of the song, which, which it’s ’80s synth production, exists within the electronic world she’s already so adept in.

Stephen Daw: I think a Charli feature on “L’Amour de Ma Vie,” especially with the song’s big electronic breakdown in its final minute, would be very cool. Maybe a duet takes the hyperpop concept and expands it into an entire dance remix for Charli and Billie to sing over, or maybe it gives Charli another chance to show off her ballad skills like she did on Brat’s SOPHIE tribute “So I” — either method would make for a stunning new version of the song. 

Jason Lipshutz: Let’s go with “The Diner” — it’s got a cheeky streak that’s up Charli’s alley, and I’m imagining her pumping up that pre-outro bridge. Let’s do it, folks!

Taylor Mims: My first thought was “Lunch” since it sonically makes sense for Charli, but I wouldn’t want to change that song in the slightest. So, “L’Amour De Ma Vie” would be my runner-up. The track would probably need to be put in electro-overdrive, but the lyrical content would be fun for Charli to step into. A Charli verse about a terrible ex would undoubtedly be a banger and would take that dagger of a song and make it a death blow.  

Andrew Unterberger: I wouldn’t be surprised if Billie and Charli were planning a “Lunch” Pt. 2 — “Linner,” perhaps? “Tea Time”? — as we speak.

Charli xcx is really your favorite reference, baby. Aminé is getting into the Brat Summer hype by dropping his “360.5” freestyle Tuesday. His 2-minute, 11-second video features a sublime Euro summer backdrop, with the sun setting behind the rapper, who’s wearing neon-green swim trunks and holding a glass of wine, in Ischia, Italy. “Yeah, 360, […]