Charli XCX has caused controversy by smoking onstage (Image: Getty)
Charli XCX came under fire for lighting up a cigarette in front of more than 23,000 fans at Manchester’s Coop Live Arena this week.
The impromptu cigarette break took place as she was singing her hit track Apple amid a huge drive from to stamp out smoking to rescue the cash-strapped NHS. Fans took to in indignation to slam the habit, branding it “nasty” and irresponsible to impressionable teens.
“Promoting smoking to audience full of minors… I stan her but this is not okay,” one argued. Another linked the habit to the UK, branding the cig break “just nasty and British”.
Someone else chimed in to say: “This is sort of sad – why is she advertising cigarettes to her fans?” Even die-hard fans didn’t hesitate to label her habit “problematic”, while one exclaimed: “As a xcxanator I’m livid!”
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Charli XCX smoking a cigarette during her performance of ‘Apple’ in Manchester (Image: TIKTOK)
Charli – real name Charlotte Emma Aitchinson – also claimed in interviews this year that she defined a Brat summer as being about “a pack of cigs, a Bic lighter and a strappy white top with no bra”.
One fan tweeted: “Are people genuinely going against this with the defence ‘not with an audience full of minors’? Did you listen to Brat?
“Who told you that was for kids? Keep your offspring away.”
Someone else agreed: “‘Promoting cigarettes to her audience of minors’ WHAT about charli xcx screams family friendly to y’all?”
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Charli XCX at a showbiz event (Image: Getty)
Prior to her Brat persona, Charli courted controversy with the 2022 album Crash as well.
Featuring song lyrics about driving a car into a bridge and not caring in the aftermath of the crash, she was then accused of glamorising “dangerous driving”.
Despite complaints, she is currently touring her sixth album, Brat, after more than a decade in the business, and is due to hit London’s 02 Arena tonight (November 28).
She’ll then be touring Birmingham and Glasgow, before heading to the other side of the world to hype up fans in Australia.