Photo by Paul Kooiker

Let’s not get too ahead of ourselves, but the more we’re hearing out of this new Charli XCX album-slash-movie soundtrack for Wuthering Heights, it’s sounding like the modern cinematic revival of the Brontë literary classic has given her every reason to revive her own gothic pop roots from where it all began over a decade earlier.

“Chains of Love”, the album’s second single, rekindles Charli’s creative relationship with producer Justin Raisen — who has since gone on to become a perfector of heavier electronic pop experiments since their True Romance days through the vessels of Kim Gordon and Yves Tumor — alongside longtime collaborator Finn Keane, f.k.a. Easyfun.

It’s just the comedown we properly needed from those BRAT summer hedonism highs in exchange for the kind of dark, wintry night heartache that devastates you to feeling like you’re on the brink of death. “Shattering like glass / Yes, they’re breaking up my heart / The chains of love are cruel, I shouldn’t feel like a prisoner / My face is turning blue,” she sings, strings swirling up an equally cruel beautiful symphony from those pits of despair. This truly is romance as Charli would have it, filled with nothing but masochism.

Charli XCX’s Wuthering Heights will be released February 13th on Atlantic Records.