Songfacts®:

• Unveiled by Charli XCX on August 18, 2014, this song finds the singer-songwriter unenthused about the impending new school year:
  
  I don't want to go to school
  I just want to break the rules
  
  "The song is inspired by a lot of the things I was listening to whilst in Sweden at the end of last year," Charli told Buzzfeed. "I spent about a month making a punk record and covering songs by Swedish punk bands like Snuffed By The Yakuza and stuff."
  
  "This song was written when I came out of the other side of that punk phase and translated it into something more pop," she added. "Obviously, it's about not giving a f--k."
• The song's music video concludes in a school prom and features Rose McGowan (Scream, Charmed) as a strict teacher. "I was inspired by movies like Jawbreaker and Carrie for the 'Break the Rules' video," said Charli. "I never went to prom when I was at school so this was kind of me living out my weird fantasy of what prom would be like in my head."
  
  "I asked Rose McGowan to be in the video and I never ever thought she would say yes, but she did," she added, "so she came to prom too... And she trashed it."
• The song was written by Charli XCX with Cashmere Cat, Robopop, Steve Mac and Stargate during a writing camp at Westlake Studios in Hollywood. "I got bad social anxiety because usually I only work with my close friends," the Boom Clap songstress recalled to Billboard magazine. "I went outside and sang this thing into my phone - wrote it in a car park in five minutes."
• Stargate are best known for their production work with pop acts such as Rihanna and Katy Perry. Charli admitted to Digital Spy that the collaboration with the Norwegian hitmakers was unexpected. "That was something that I never thought would happen, because I feel that when I first signed a record deal I was really anti-Stargate and those kinds of producers," she said. "Then I began working with them because I'm actually published by them and I found out how incredibly clever they are and I've learnt a lot from them."
  
  "We work in the same way, we both work very fast and very quickly," Charli added. "They just have such a great ear for pop music, but what's really cool about them is that they're not about singles, they make cool songs as well, so it's been cool working with them. We did some good stuff together and I never thought I'd work with them but they're great. They're like two Norwegian masterminds!"
• Charli XCX regrets recording this song. She told Q magazine:
  
  "I made some rash decisions with Sucker, like the song 'Break The Rules.' That was so bad. I hate it.
  
  I wrote it at a writing camp for other artists with Benny Blanco and Stargate and I was like, 'Whoever sings this song is an idiot.' Cut to four months later, it's on my album, and it's my new single. I f---ed myself."