The Drivers License singer reflects on turning her first big breakup into the year’s biggest hit – and how songwriting saved her from the anxieties of being a Disney star
Do you remember your first heartbreak? If not, 18-year-old Olivia Rodrigo’s debut single, Drivers License, may awaken some dusty memories. The story of passing her test and driving past the house of the ex she had planned to celebrate with, it filters Adele-scale devastation through Taylor Swift’s wit and Lorde’s mysticism, balancing hangdog self-pity (“I’ve never felt this way for no one!”) with stinging indignation: “Guess you didn’t mean what you wrote in that song about me!” she belts at its climax. Perhaps being called out as a phoney songwriter is even worse than being a cad.
Released in January, Drivers License sprang (almost) out of nowhere like a heaved sob. Four days later, it broke Spotify records for the most single-day streams (Christmas songs exempted). The next day, it broke that record again. After 10 weeks at No 1 in the US and nine in the UK, it has been streamed 1.9bn times. Next Tuesday, the California-born songwriter makes her live debut at the Brits; the following weekend, she does Saturday Night Live; a week later she releases her debut album, Sour, a grippingly well written – all by her – collection of balladry, pop-punk, bitter diatribes and euphoric taunts that dwells on this romantic treachery. Even in an era when virality powers pop, Rodrigo’s is a fast rise.
