I drove 3 hours at the crack of dawn on a workday to see Charli XCX for the third time in 4 months. It was worth it.

• I've been a Charli XCX superfan for years and saw her when I was 14.
• Now, I'm a working adult but still a superfan. I've made time to see her perform three times this year.

In 2017, Charli XCX opened for Halsey on her Hopeless Fountain Kingdom tour. Somewhere on the internet, a photo can be found: 14-year-old me in ripped black skinny jeans with blue hair, and 25-year-old Charli in a holographic pink windbreaker set with a high pony.

By that time, Charli had already had her breakthrough — three years earlier in 2014, first with her feature on Iggy Azalea's hit single "Fancy" and then "Boom Clap," her first Billboard Top 10 single as the lead artist. She was well into establishing her own niche in the hyperpop genre after releasing her 2016 EP "Vroom Vroom" and the mixtapes "Number 1 Angel," and "Pop 2."

Seven years later, in 2024, things are different — for both of us.

Charli's star was already on the rise in 2017, but it hadn't reached the zenith it would with the release of her album "Brat" this summer. As for me, I'm no longer a teenager but a working professional en route to see Charli perform yet again, this time at the Storm King Art Center, a world-famous outdoor sculpture garden in upstate New York.

It'll be a three-hour drive from my apartment in Brooklyn. I'm making the trek at 6 a.m. so I have plenty of time to clock into my remote job at 9 a.m. on the dot and get some work done. This will be my third time seeing the pop star perform in four months and the second time I've managed to fit my fandom around my work schedule.

Each show, from tiny venues to massive arenas, has been well worth it. But the Storm King show was my best experience yet, and well worth missing some work.

Experiencing Charli XCX's "Brat" live for the first time felt like more than just a concert— it was a celebration of her rise to pop stardom.

My first time seeing Charli perform this year was at the Brooklyn Paramount on June 11, four days after the release of "Brat."

Fans subscribed to the artist's text chain had received a message on March 24 reading, "i know u hate when i send you my tiktoks… tomorrow's not going to be a tiktok :)." Sure enough, the next day at 11:01 a.m., another text was sent — this time, a link to the ticketing platform dice.fm.

The tickets sold out within 15 minutes; I thankfully got mine in nine.

A few months later, there I was. The people surrounding me, I knew, were Charli's real fans, the ones who already knew all the lyrics, who'd already bought their "Brat" green merch. These were the fans who always knew Charli would one day take over the dance-pop world and were thrilled to go along for the yearslong ride.

Above me, Julia Fox and Lorde were dancing, and around me, thousands of people were following suit. If anything, it felt more like a celebration than a concert.

The Brooklyn Paramount is a relatively small venue — the theater has a 2,700-person capacity — and the intimate show was the perfect introduction to experiencing the album live. Each subsequent show was a very different, though equally thrilling, experience.

Despite the last-minute scramble for tickets, the "Sweat" tour's electric atmosphere made every moment worth it.

Next, I went to the Wells Fargo Arena in Philadelphia for Charli XCX and Troye Sivan's co-headlined "Sweat" tour.

At first, I wasn't able to get tickets to the "Sweat" tour because they sold out quickly. I thought I would be able to let it go, given that tickets that retailed for $79.50 without fees were now selling for upward of $300, and I had already gotten to see "Brat" live once. But deep down, I knew I couldn't miss out on this opportunity.

After realizing how much cheaper it would be to see the show anywhere but in New York, I snagged tickets to the Wells Fargo show in Philly for $160, half the price that I would have paid a reseller for similar seats at Madison Square Garden. After clocking out at 5 p.m., I made the drive straight from work to an 8:30 p.m. show.

Thankfully, the rush-hour traffic didn't derail my plans, and neither did the quick pit stop to change outfits in a random Wendy's bathroom en route.

The energy at this show was completely different from the one before it. Sivan and Charli XCX know how to get a crowd excited. All it took was one "hands up," and thousands of arms eagerly flew into the air. I could have been seated anywhere in that arena and felt the same amount of passion and joy.

It is no secret that a smaller venue calls for a better show, but the "Sweat" tour was electric — even from Section 203 of Wells Fargo, a sold-out arena holding over 16,000 people.

I had a better view at Brooklyn Paramount where I spent roughly $100 less on my ticket, but the second show was still worth every penny and the stressful drive, even though I had to squint a bit.

Charli's intimate performance at Storm King was my best experience yet, and the perfect reminder that "Brat" isn't just an album — it's a state of mind.

Charli XCX's set at Storm King on October 10, a surprise album release celebration for her remix record "Brat and It's Completely Different but Also Still Brat," changed the game.

The event was thoughtful and surprisingly intimate for such a spacious outdoor venue, with less than 1,000 fans in attendance. (Attendees had to secure their spot by signing up for an RSVP list; Business Insider was able to attend the event as press.)

Special shirts reading "art" on the front and "Charli XCX at Storm King" on the back in the signature "Brat" font were handed out to fans. The beverage company Vitamin Water had stations set up offering drinks. Trucks from local vendors were providing food and alcoholic beverages, some of which were "Brat"-themed. And it was all free.

A little past the food and drinks stood a 30-foot by 30-foot replica of a halfway-open gatefold cover of her new remix album, set to be released the next day — and nestled between the back fold of the vinyl was a DJ booth.

Soon enough, Charli arrived, stepping out of a black Cadillac Escalade in a fur-trimmed coat and baggy light-wash jeans. She walked over to the DJ booth, passing by hundreds of screaming fans, and played some songs from her new remix album straight off of her iPhone. She made time to speak to the crowd a bit, even though she said she hadn't planned on it, and then left right back into the Escalade— on to her next show for the "Sweat" tour in Denver the following day.

In all, she was probably there for about an hour, but she made the most of it.

Charli worked the crowd, going back and forth from behind the "Brat" green booth, to on top of it. She seemed eager to get as close to her fans as possible (which wasn't too difficult, given there was surprisingly no barricade or security set up).

Everyone was pressed up against each other, and Charli was dancing with the crowd like we were all just friends at a bar. I had never experienced anything like it.

But the show didn't end when Charli left. Fans, journalists, and influencers alike stayed and danced as the album played on a loop until Storm King employees finally told everyone it was time to go at 6:30 p.m.

I didn't want to leave. Looking around at the red and orange foliage, leaving Storm King felt like saying goodbye to something bigger: "Brat" summer itself.

But Charli XCX's Storm King show was the perfect farewell to "Brat" summer, and the best possible welcome to "Brat" autumn: a new, but still familiar, era for an artist who's proven she knows how to market herself (and keep the hype going long past the mini-skirt and sunglasses-inside weather).

I'm already excited to see what Charli has in store for the next show I go to. (Hopefully not in the middle of another workday.)