At the ripe age of 20, Olivia Rodrigo is already an industry veteran. After setting out to pursue her Hollywood dreams at 12, Rodrigo sounds like an old soul when describing the vibe of her upcoming sophomore album. It’s a time capsule commemorating a moment in which she feels like she’s “figuring stuff out, about failures and success and making mistakes,” the singer told Vogue for its August cover story.
The interview took place in New York’s East Village at the launch of what the magazine said was Rodrigo’s New York Era, as the singer recently moved from her native California into a new apartment in the city, where she spent much of last year writing her sophomore album, GUTS (Sept. 8).
As for what those mistakes and failures are, well, Rodrigo said, “you’ll have to listen to the rest of the album.” Writer Jia Tolentino did get to hear four unnamed songs from GUTS, describing two “wrenching, cinematic ballads,” she said were crafted with a “new self-assurance,” as well as two others that were “playful and insouciant.”
Rodrigo’s longtime producer and co-songwriter, Dan Nigro, said Olivia is the kind of artist that just clearly displayed that special spark from day one. “There’s this je ne sais quoi to Olivia,” he said of the singer who went from booking an American Doll movie at 12 to co-starring in the Disney series Bizaardvark before graduating to the lead in 2019’s High School Musical: The Musical: The Series. “People either have it or they don’t.”
Describing the songs on the album as anthems that “simply captured what it was like to be 20, an age when you’re sometimes blazing with ridiculous lust, thrilled to be seen as beautiful, enraged by other people’s expectations,” Tolentino said Rodrigo had threaded the difficult needle of avoiding “bubblegum locker-door fairy tales” while also sidestepping aggressive statements about being edgy and grown.
“Olivia can’t be anything other than herself,” Nigro said of the singer who reveals that Bruce Springsteen is her “biggest celebrity crush” of all time while perusing the racks of an East Village record store. “There’s never a sense in the studio of her trying to fit into a mold, or sound like anything that anyone might want her to.” He also noted that GUTS is a decided turn away from the melancholy vibe of her 2021 debut, Sour.
And while the vibe is a bit different, as with her Billboard Hot 100 No. 1 hits “Drivers License” and “Good 4 U,” romantic drama is still never too far away. One of the songs, which reportedly has tinges of Le Tigre, Charli XCX and the Josie and the Pussycats soundtrack, was about Olivia hurtling into an “ill-advised and irresistible night with an ex.” Another tackles the minefield of expectations that are put on idealized young women, “the pressure to be sexy, thoughtful, funny, kind, inspiration, easygoing, endlessly grateful,” even as the riot grrrl-like chorus rips those ideas to shreds.
Rodrigo didn’t just flip through the shelves at the store, though, she also weighed in on the Supreme Court’s 2022 decision striking down Roe v. Wade. She said that the rollback of reproductive rights in America feels “actually insane — I think it’s sickening.” She talks about how young women of her generation might be, “forced to give birth if they get pregnant… It is so scary. It’s such a terrifying reality.”
Then, reflecting on her repeated assertions during 2021 that young female pop singers have a best-listened-to-by-30 expiration date, Rodrigo said that she was under the impression that the younger you are, “the more successful you’ll be in the music industry.” Now, however, she has had an about-face on that notion, rejecting the idea that “value is externally defined.”
“I think I believed in these false ideas for a little while,” she said. “The most painful moment of my life turned into my most successful.” Realizing that the correlation between pain and success do not have to be directly linked, Rodrigo said she now understands that you can write good music while you’re growing a lot and that that is something that could go on for your whole career.
And, in another savvy veteran move, she was very cautious about going into specific detail about what (or more precisely, who) her highly autobiographical-sounding lyrics are about. That explains why she wouldn’t name the “bloodsucker, fame f–ker” she calls out on lead single, “Vampire.” Funnily for an artist whose songs often take deep dives into heartbreak and love’s confusion, she was also cagey about whether she’s dating now, offering, “I don’t kiss and tell.”
Because while she can fathom the public fascination with her love life — “I understand it. I could sit here and be like, ‘I don’t get why people do that,’ but I do it so often” — she said she writes her lyrics to understand her emotions better, but once they’re out in the world they don’t belong to just her anymore.
“She begins by speaking for herself, but she speaks, in the end, for so many young women,” said her inspiration songwriting legend Carole King. “And I love her. I’ve only met her for one afternoon, but I love her.”
Check out pictures from the Vogue shoot below.
Olivia Rodrigo for Vogue’s August 2023 issue. Loewe top. Prada skirt.
Théo de Gueltzl
Olivia Rodrigo for Vogue’s August 2023 issue. Miu Miu turtleneck sweater and briefs. Valentino Garavani shoes. Tiffany & Co. necklace.
Théo de Gueltzl
