As the album opens up, Olivia Rodrigo’s varied talents begin to flower. The further we get from the sound, subject, and structure of “Drivers License,” the more versatility the arrangements and writing are able to express.
The fifth and sixth incarnations of the quiet song about the ex’s two-week layover between girlfriends aren’t as vital as the first few. As great as many of these breakup tunes are - “Deja Vu” and “Traitor” are first-ballot hall of fame material - and as committed as Olivia Rodrigo seems to be to isolating and identifying the reasons we stay in bad romantic situations as much as she calls out guys who woo you with a well-rehearsed shtick and bounce as soon as things get complicated, Sour’s laser focus feels limiting. “Deja Vu” is vindictive, but in “Enough for You,” she regrets caring. “Traitor” accepts responsibility for keeping quiet about a boy’s wandering eye as much as it skewers him for leaving. The lover sending mixed signals in “1 Step Forward, 3 Steps Back” is obviously bad news the song is as much about the yearning that leads us to override our better judgment as it is about the wishy-washy boy. Sour, Olivia Rodrigo’s debut album, is a breakup record that teaches lessons about insecurity, anxiety, and trust using the sting of a breakup and its turbulent aftermath as inspirations, obscuring specifics just enough and floating just enough harsh self-criticism to shield its songs from accusations of vengefulness. But sharing is taxing recently, Swift’s writing has shifted to a more novelistic approach that explores the plights of fictitious characters, historical figures, and family members as much as it reflects on her own. With luck, a singer’s care in walking us through uncomfortable past experiences creates a rapport with the audience. Realism equals authenticity equals emotional heft. That shift in perspective, that dizzying zoom out, is one of the hallmarks of great songwriting.Ī dyed-in-the-wool Swiftie, Rodrigo, 18, takes a page from Taylor’s playbook there, balancing recollections of a relationship that was good until things went south with anthemic lyrics listeners can apply to their own lives, just as a song like “ We Are Never Getting Back Together” weaponizes specificity as a method of winding up the haymaker in the refrain. Rodrigo’s verses tell personal stories, then her chorus highlights a place we’ve all been, no matter how many different roads we took to get there. You don’t need to be a Disney Channel star who has just seen her Disney Channel co-star boyfriend buzz off with yet another Disney Channel co-star to relate to the feelings of abandonment and upheaval that the song conveys, or to be fresh off the learner’s-permit circuit - as Rodrigo is in the first line of the song - to feel weird cruising past haunts that remind you of failed relationships, as the singer does throughout the remainder of that verse.
OLIVIA RODRIGO DEJA VU REVIEWS DRIVERS
Olivia Rodrigo’s “ Drivers License” is one such song.
OLIVIA RODRIGO DEJA VU REVIEWS PATCH
You don’t have to be married in a rough patch to tap into the dignified frustration of Beyoncé’s “ Don’t Hurt Yourself” or to have had several publicized breakups to know the grace and gratitude of Ariana Grande’s “ Thank U, Next.” Like parables, good love songs get listeners to identify with a singer and to reflect on what we might do, or what we have done, when confronted with a situation like theirs. The good ones are able to resonate in spite of (or, at times, because of) the specificities and trivialities of their own circumstances. And sometimes they are! More often, they’re not.Ī pop songwriter’s job is to make the personal and the mundane seem universal and significant, to relay, via sharing one’s own thoughts and experiences, some finer understanding of the human condition. In the thick of it, these feel like matters of planetary consequence.
Everyone’s trying to hit big and cash out, but to win is to risk and learn failure. Putting yourself out there is a gamble sometimes love is a losing game. Maybe you luck out and find someone kind, thoughtful, and quietly sophisticated, and you feel like you’ll never meet the day where you stop being impressed and surprised. Suddenly, someone means the world to you, and short-term happiness is contingent upon how well they handle that.
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