Charli XCX has shared a cryptic video online amid her rumoured feud with Taylor Swift.
Following the release of Taylor’s twelfth studio album, The Life of a Showgirl, last week, fans began to speculate that the song Actually Romantic is a diss track aimed at the Brat hitmaker.
Representatives for the pop star and British singer, real name Charlotte Aitchison, have not yet addressed the speculation.
But taking to X on Sunday, Charli posted a mysterious five-second video showing an engineer sitting at a mixing board in a recording studio.
The footage features a gradual swelling sound and two notes played in quick succession.
Charli put a heart symbol in the caption but didn’t offer any further details.
In Actually Romantic, Taylor seems to call out an unnamed celebrity.
“I heard you call me ‘Boring Barbie’ when the coke’s got you brave/ High-fived my ex and then you said you’re glad he ghosted me/ Wrote me a song saying it makes you sick to see my face,” she sings.
In the chorus, the Blank Spice singer also insists she’s not “offended” by the comments because she thinks it’s “actually sweet” and “actually romantic” that the person has been spending so much time thinking about her.
Though the source of the subject matter remains unknown, keen fans have pointed out that Charli has referenced drug use in her music before and has a song on her 2024 album Brat titled Everything Is Romantic.
And in her track Sympathy Is a Knife, the 33-year-old also reflects on feeling insecure around a female singer and not wanting to see her at The 1975’s shows.
This led fans to make another link to Taylor, as she briefly dated the band’s frontman, Matty Healy, while Charli is married to his bandmate, George Daniel.
Explaining the inspiration behind Actually Romantic during The Official Release Party of a Showgirl cinematic event, Taylor described the track as “a love letter to someone who hates you”.
“As I’ve gotten older, I’ve just started to be like, ‘Oh my God, you did so much with this. It’s flattering. That is, wow, that is very, very sweet of you to think about me this much, even if it’s negative. In my industry, attention is affection, and you’ve given me a whole lot of it,'” she said.
