Charlotte O'Connor is the daughter of a half-
Malawian, half-Indian mother and Irish father. She grew up in
Blackburn, Lancashire, and attended
Westholme School. She began playing the guitar at 15 years of age and attended weekend classes at the
Liverpool Institute for Performing Arts. When she was 16 years old, she became a global ambassador for surfwear brand
Quiksilver. O'Connor's music attracted the attention of agent Sam Bush, who signed her to a contract and arranged gigs for her in the United States. She signed a four-album recording deal with
Columbia Records in late 2008, when she was 18 years old. O'Connor was dropped by Columbia and subsequently took work in her mother's hairdressing salon. She released her first EP,
Colour My Heart, in November 2013 under the stage name
Charlotte OC; the same month, the
BBC classed her as "tipped for success in 2014" Her second EP,
Strange, was released by
Polydor Records in September 2014, and its track "Hangover" was playlisted on
BBC Radio 1.
Colour My Heart and
Strange were recorded with producer
Tim Anderson in Los Angeles. In March 2015, O'Connor released her third EP,
Burning, which features the single "If My House Was Burning". Her first album, the Anderson-produced
Careless People, was released on 31 March 2017. It spawned four singles, "Darkest Hour", "Blackout", "Shell", and "Medicine Man". On 15 May 2020, O'Connor released the EP
Oh the Agony, Oh the Ecstasy featuring the three previously published songs "This Pain", "Freedom" and "Falling for You" as well as two new songs. Since April 2021, the singer-songwriter released several new singles and EP's from her second studio album,
Here Comes Trouble, which O'Connor released on 15 October 2021. ==Artistry==