Editor’s Note: This article is a review and includes subjective thoughts, opinions and critiques.
Olivia Rodrigo’s third album (OR3), “you seem pretty sad for a girl so in love,” is coming out on June 12, and I’m pressing play when it does. Over the last two months, Rodrigo released three songs ahead of the album — “drop dead,” “begged” and “the cure” — giving listeners just a taste of the singable, emotional tracks on OR3.
Like many others, I jumped on the Livie train during her second album “GUTS” (2023). I had heard her chart-toppers from “SOUR” (2021), but at 14, I hadn’t gotten my driver’s license nor suffered a traitorous breakup. Naturally, at 16, I found Rodrigo’s songs about social pressure, comparison and belonging more relatable. She captured the teenage-girl experience in a way that makes screaming her lyrics — “God, it’s brutal out here” — in the car cathartic and validating.
Three years after “GUTS,” Rodrigo teased her upcoming album with the color pink in murals, outfits and heart-shaped locks, foreshadowing a switch from angsty breakup music to love songs.
The first single, “drop dead,” was released on April 17 and perfectly introduces this shift. The song opens with wobbly, distorted instrumentals that sharply depart from her usual piano, bass or guitar intros.
In “drop dead,” Rodrigo’s layered vocals create an echoey quality, deepening the chorus as her voice glides up and down. My favorite part is the coda, where her harmonies fold into the instruments and sound just like heaven. Poetic lyrics like “It’s feminine intuition” and “You’re so so pretty boy, I’m paranoid I made you up” roll off her tongue with tasteful assonance and alliteration.
The quick, breathy second verse (“And I feel like I might throw up”) is Chappell Roan-esque and gives an unoriginal pop-girlie vibe that I didn’t initially click with. The chanting “Pisces and a Gemini” bridge also feels too familiar and cliché.
Still, the lyrics are giddy and genuine, like excited texts sent from a restaurant bathroom mid-date. In fact, Rodrigo told Cosmopolitan that she wrote this song “after a really great first date.” I like the themes of fate and permanence that characterize young love, along with the travel imagery appearing in music videos shot in London and Versailles.
After two weeks of replaying “drop dead,” I watched Rodrigo debut “begged” on Saturday Night Live.
This single is where the album’s title, “you seem pretty sad,” started to make sense. This song is short and simple — just a girl and her guitar — leaving listeners begging for more. “begged” shows off Rodrigo’s range and vocal control as her voice effortlessly trails through two verses and two choruses.
The lyrics lean into basic metaphors of an “anchor in the ocean” and “a penny in a fountain.” She describes herself as clinging to hope “like snow on mountains.” The song’s theme about wanting things from people without having to ask is universally relatable for relationships.
“Cool and forgiving, I’ll take what you’re giving… But nothing’s quite enough whеn I know that to get it, I begged,” Rodrigo sings. Unlike “enough for you,” her previous song, in “begged,” she sings about her own dissatisfaction and wanting someone else to be enough for her.
On May 22 — the five-year anniversary of “SOUR” — Rodrigo released “the cure,” describing it on her social media as both the album’s thesis statement and her personal favorite track.
In a letter to her fan mailing list, Rodrigo wrote: “‘the cure’ continues my cathartic tradition of songwriting through my most vulnerable & raw moments, but it’s also a culmination of all the life ive lived & growth ive experienced since SOUR.”
The song opens with tense minor chord strumming that grows more urgent as strings and piano join in. The verses have a similar whispery quality to “drop dead.” Rodrigo ends the third verse with a repeated line: “I thought I found the antidote this time.” Her voice wavers on “time” into the refrain “I’m unraveled,” mirroring the lyric itself.
After the refrain, she charges into a more powerful second chorus, and the song progresses into more complex instrumentation. The refrain returns before a classic OR bridge: “Why can’t you come stitch me up? Why can’t it ever be enough?” Drums build up behind her desperate chanting, ushering in a commanding final chorus. Full instrumentals and distant backing vocals make this the clear climax of “the cure,” and strings keep the momentum running into a beautifully bittersweet closing melody.
For newer fans, the song offers plenty of throwbacks highlighting Rodrigo’s growth.
In the chorus, she sings, “I’ve got toxins in my bloodstream. You tried hard to suck ’em out,” recalling her song “vampire.” But “in the cure,” she describes a relationship she hoped would heal rather than exploit her. She emphasizes her well-being in this song (“It’s good for me, I’m sure”), compared to previous songs like “good for u,” which focused on an ex.
Similarly, the bridge (“Why can’t you come stitch me up?”) differs from a lyric in “get him back”: “I want to break his heart and be the one to stitch it up.” Instead of taking care of someone else, she’s asking for someone to heal her.
As I finish my first year at Stanford, Rodrigo reminds me that there is more to life than COLLEGE readings and research papers. Listening to “you seem pretty sad” makes me want to wander a new city, fall in love and sing along. Instead of dropping dead from academic pressure, I’ll join Rodrigo to value fulfilling relationships and be okay with asking for help.
Maybe you’ve never been in love or had a first date good enough to send you dancing through Versailles. But when you do, you’ll know what to play on the drive home.