Some fans are convinced that Vampire – specifically the yelled “bloodsucker, fame fucker, bleedin’ me dry like a goddamn vampire!” – is about Swift, especially given that signs of their budding friendship vanished after the credits issue. (Swift recently invited Sabrina Carpenter, the rumoured other party in the Drivers License heartbreak, to support her Eras tour.) “How do I answer this?” Rodrigo whispers at the table when I ask her. “I mean, I never want to say who any of my songs are about. I’ve never done that before in my career and probably won’t. I think it’s better to not pigeonhole a song to being about this one thing.” She laughs nervously (she often laughs nervously). “I was very surprised when people thought that.”
‘I had all these feelings of rage I couldn’t express’: Olivia Rodrigo on overnight pop superstardom, plagiarism and growing up in public https://t.co/NravOox9nS
— The Guardian (@guardian) September 2, 2023
On the plagiarizing scrutiny over Good 4 U and Deja Vu: At the time, she said it was “disappointing to see people take things out of context and discredit any young woman’s work”. Did the potential for similar scrutiny make her second-guess writing Guts? She grows vague. “I was so green as to how the music industry worked, the litigious side … I feel like now I know so much more about the industry and I just feel … better equipped in that regard. It wasn’t something I thought about too much.”
On if she has watched The Idol and Barbie: “Oh no. I don’t have the desire to. I remember walking out of ‘Barbie’ and being like, ‘Wow, it’s so long since I’ve seen a movie that is female-centred in a way that isn’t sexual or about her pain or her being traumatised.'”
Olivia Rodrigo on fear of getting backlash for being vocal about social injustices while working at Disney: “I didn’t really pay attention to it or let it affect me.” Being a puppet, she says, “doesn’t work any more.”
On Billie Eyelash: “[She’s] really sweet and supportive.”
On not signing with Disney’s Hollywood Records: Then Disney execs invited her to write an original song for her HSM character. After the piano ballad All I Want went viral, Rodrigo sought a record deal. Unlike her Disney forebears Miley Cyrus, Selena Gomez and Demi Lovato, she chose not to make (inevitably sanitised) music for the corporation’s in-house label, and picked Interscope/Geffen because they were the only label she met that perceived her as a songwriter, not a pop star, and didn’t blow smoke up her ass.
📸| Olivia per The Guardian pic.twitter.com/4oK0W4rfNy
— Olivia Rodrigo ITALIA🇮🇹 (@oliviarodrigITA) September 2, 2023
GUTS drops next week on September 8th. You can read her full interview at the first source.
