Charli XCX’s Wuthering Heights soundtrack receives positive reviews
The soundtrack was released on Friday.
Charli XCX’s latest album, the soundtrack for the new adaptation of Wuthering Heights, has been described as “wild” and “gothic”, with one critic hailing its “uniformly fantastic” songwriting.
The film Wuthering Heights, from Saltburn director Emerald Fennell, is a very loose adaptation of the classic gothic novel by Emily Bronte and was released in the UK on Friday, as was the soundtrack of the same name.
The record is Charli XCX’s seventh studio album, and includes three already released singles: House, Chains Of Love and Wall Of Sound.
The pop star, 33, shot to stratospheric heights after the release of her chart-topping Brat album in 2024.
Her latest offering, Wuthering Heights, features collaborations with Welsh musician John Cale and US singer Sky Ferreira and has received high praise from critics.
Awarding it five out of five stars, The Independent said: “The whole thing is a phantasmagorical fever dream that relishes its weird and experimental noises without sacrificing cool hooks or accessible language.
“Charli proves herself much more in tune with the terrible complexity of Bronte’s original vision than Fennell: there are no inverted commas around the emotion expressed on this record. A windswept, gothic triumph.”
The Irish Times also gave it five stars, describing it as a “fantastically weird album” and calling it experimental and artistic.
The Guardian gave it four stars and described it as “atonal, disruptive, industrial”, adding: “The song writing is uniformly fantastic – she clearly doesn’t view pushing at the boundaries of what she does as any reason to abandon her pop smarts – and furthermore, it works as an album completely independent from the film it’s intended to accompany.”
UK music magazine Clash gave it a rating of 8/10, calling it a “cinematic triumph”, while The Daily Mail awarded the soundtrack four stars – calling it a “worthy successor” to her Brat album.
Awarding it four out of five stars, Rolling Stone magazine said: “Wuthering Heights isn’t a soundtrack or a score. It’s a fully realized album, with great songs that add a whole new musical texture to her always-changing sensibility.”
It added: “It’s this cutting-edge artist’s most tradition-minded record.”
Meanwhile, The Financial Times gave the record three stars and said it “struggles to stand on its own feet”, calling it “neither fish nor fowl”.
