i only threw this party 4 u
it's my party & i'll party & cry, even if it's parasocial
I only threw this party for you is a lyric in Charli XCX’s 2020 song, party 4 u that is from her pandemic album, how i’m feeling now. The newly resurged sleeper hit is in essence, a modern-day take on Lesley Gore’s classic 1963 song, It’s My Party; which today is a classic pity-party ballad and cocktail standard, easily recognizable at any piano bar.
In her hit, Gore sings a lyrically wrenching and powerful anthem. She is in the throes of being love-sick for someone who couldn’t care less, someone who doesn’t give her the time of day. A prominent lyrical plot-line is that Gore invites her dear Johnny to her party, who hasn’t arrived and is a no-show because he is elsewhere with Judy; leaving Gore alone to participate in her own party.
The imagery of Gore surrounded by her guests while feeling so alone and wounded by her unrequited or estranged lover is a specific strain of grief, the wounding is so potent that it’s piercing through the lyrics.
Gore is catapulted into an ache so evocative that she can’t conceal it away from her party guests. So, she’ll cry, in front all of them, if she wants to. Almost as if she is unashamed and wearing her ache as armor.
It’s a complex and niche disappointment known All Too Well, or as Taylor Swift laments in her 10-minute version of the song, You who charmed my dad with self-effacing jokes/ Sipping coffee like you’re on a late-night show/But then he watched me watch the door all night, willing you to come/ And he said, ‘it’s supposed to be fun turning twenty-one.’
When you experience the distinctive and shattering heartbreak of someone romantically disappointing you IRL; particularly on your birthday, during a celebration or an event that you had anticipated with high hopes, it’s an emotional bruising that takes a lot of saline solution and care to heal. Especially since birthday’s, in general, are already a complex anniversary to experience, cased with complex feelings. Last year, Popsugar reported on the phenomena, in an essay titled The Psychological Reason Hot Girls Cry On Their Birthday.
Even when healed, the memory of the person you counted on for support—rejecting you—becomes a cautionary tale for future romantic prospects. It’s always a haunting possibility, even within the most stable and healthy relationships and dynamics.
Sometimes you’re rejected, regardless of rhyme or reason and you have to hold yourself within that rejection. Life will go on for everyone else around you. Including the person who just broke your heart. And now, you have to learn to lick those wounds both silently and loudly as you re-emerge to yourself by yourself.
Lately, my TikTok timeline is a perpetual stream of different TV and film edits that play party 4 u in the background. The virality and cinematic range that the hyper-pop song has only has cemented the song to reach new heights of appreciation and even higher chart performance.
It’s similar to how Lena Dunham’s HBO show, Girls saw an unexpected, nostalgic, and addictive viewership resurgence through TikTok that re-popularized the show to Gen Z audiences.
No matter the film or series being depicted along with the Charli hit, scrolling through my FYP, it’s almost as if I’m in a parasocial simulation; re-experiencing a sinking ship in my stomach as I watch the various storylines of heartbreak unfold. Perhaps even reliving some emotional residue from my own previous romantic endings. On loop and in different fantasy realms with different characters in different countries through different contact lenses. It’s actually making me wonder, how much and how often do these social media trends intentionally illicit emotions out of me without the foresight to recognize it upon and during impact?
Like how in Fleabag, Fleabag is rejected by the Priest after the pair have a love affair together (which is pretty forbidden & taboo, fyi), and soon after their dalliance, he refused to leave the church and begin a partnership with her. Which is a permanent and conclusive ending to their relationship. Ouch.
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Or in Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince when Ron Weasley kisses his new love interest, Lavender in front of everyone in Gryffindor, including Hermione. Who then has to watch the person she loves hand over affection to someone else while already experiencing tension and conflict in her dynamic with Ron.
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While in 2024’s critically lauded and awarded film, Anora, Anora (spoiler alert) slowly realizes throughout the film that her marriage to Ivan is imploding and that he essentially views their marriage as a vacation from his responsibilities as a Russian oligarch’s son. Rather than taking the commitment seriously like she had, which makes her story all the more devastating because it tugs on and subverts the smoke and mirrors of a rags to riches story into a temporarily lived fairytale. A fairytale that falls short of the happy ending, unfulfilled with no direct resolution. Much like how we end up grieving former loves, crushes, and friendships, but without a cinematographer to make it all aesthetically pleasing to digest.
It goes without saying that The Great Gatsby and the significance of the green light as a literary device are symptomatic of Charli XCX’s party 4 u syndrome. Today, the green light looks like posting to your story just so you can see who views, maybe even curating what you're posting to hopefully warrant a response from a specific crush, tailored to their interests. While in the Jazz Age of prohibition and hedonistic libertine, Jay Gatsby only had to throw lavish and opulent parties every single night at his Long Island estate in desperation for his neighbor and former flame, Daisy Buchanan to notice.
In a more abridged retelling, in the current techno-feudal era of advanced capitalism, Gatsby is essentially partying 4 daisy; partying on the hope of her reciprocation while simultaneously trying to party her into a manifestation come true. Or as the infamous West Village Girlies would now say, Jay Gatsby is Delulu.
Tomorrow, how i’m feeling now turns five years old since its initial release. And to celebrate, of course, Charli XCX has announced that she is releasing an official music video for the song.
Late last month, the pop star confirmed the exact meaning of the song on TikTok, ‘this is actually the moment you realize that that one person isn’t ever coming to your party so you stand in the middle of the room, tears briefly fill your eyes but then you wipe them away, pretend you’re ok and proceed to get unbelievably fucked up and then spend the next week feeling completely ashamed of yourself,’ which received 12.6 million views and counting.
Over the course of the last few months, I myself lived through a breakup and the subsequent kaleidoscope of coping: deleting your ex’s number, having a love tarot reading, long phone calls with friends rehashing each and every moment leading up to the breakup as if it would offer a hint or clue, snorting cocaine with a group of girls I just met at a friend’s birthday party, re-joining the dating apps, talking to new people, and then resettling into my life and routine, content with myself and my life choices again post-separation.
Someone, long ago (I can’t remember who), once told me that having a birthday party or throwing any kind of party where you are inviting people over as guests is actually an opportunity to see who is genuinely there for you. And although rejection can sting, I do honor that special place in my heart that still tries. That still sends the invite (as long as it’s not on Partiful). That still sends the text. That still wants to host a prospective love interest or estranged partner in my body and in my home. Despite all the false starts and tectonic plate shifts and breakups and changes.
Sometimes, instead of that person choosing you and showing up, you end up pissed drunk on a night out— in a blurry, internal, and somehow super visceral state outwardly attempting to party it all away. But nonetheless, your mind is still partying for a no-show as if your feelings are an optical illusion of itself.