His debut in 1976, with the indie rock project Arishi, passed unnoticed, but the later band Taxi had a greater success and recorded the eponymous album in 1988.
During this time, Charkviani collaborated with Kote Kubaneishvili to establish the Reactive Club (Georgian: რეაქტიული კლუბი), a revolutionary art-collective that ran counter to the accepted Soviet poetry style and was a reaction "against provincialism".
Leading the projects Children's Medicine (1991-1992), and Georgian Dance Empire (1993), he performed throughout Georgia as well as abroad, particularly in Moscow and Eastern Europe.
[4] Charkviani was found dead, reportedly of "heart problems",[5] at his apartment in Tbilisi on 24 February 2006,[1] leaving several unpublished songs which were subsequently released as the album Dzirs Mepe ("Down with the King") in 2007.
In May 2013 Irakli Charkviani was posthumously awarded Georgia's Rustaveli Prize for "his significant contribution to the development of contemporary Georgian culture".