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Charli xcx at Glastonbury review – a thrilling hostile takeover by a pop star at the peak of her powers

Playing to a dizzyingly huge crowd, for many this is Saturday’s true headlining set: a bawdy and uncompromising icon playing alone with no frills

Like the album it was supporting, the Yeezus tour was abrasive and minimal and totally spectacular: West stood in front of gigantic bright-red screens and blasted arenas with some of the harshest, most acidic sounds ever considered mainstream. This makes sense, given that Charli is also our clearest successor to West himself: despite being a prodigiously talented mainstream songwriter, she has dedicated her career to exploring the most caustic, hallucinatory sounds of the underground, and working out how best to synthesise them with the pleasures of pure pop music. And from the very first moments of her set, when she intones, gravely, “Glastonbury, don’t fucking play with me”, it’s clear that she is at the height of her powers, totally capable of holding the attention of a stadium’s worth of people.

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