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| Like I said before: Rockstar |
Since then, I’ve basically become a full-blown Livie (aka RodrigHO). Yeah, it’s pretty sad. Or awesome? I meant to say awesome. I am very aware that I, a 42 year old man, am not her target audience. But damn she's great.
ANYWAY, because I’m now a fan and know a little (okay, a
LOT) more about her music, I have decided that her promotional single “All I
Want” should definitely count towards her ranked discography, despite it coming
from her pre-Geffen time in the Disney factory. Although nothing else from her
Disney time (including “The Rose Song” or anything from Bizzardvark) should count. Why? I
mean come on, let’s show a little some common sense here. Although maybe this one from
And also, like a day after I did my rankings last
time she dropped the new single from The Hunger Games prequel. And then in March 2024, her four “hidden tracks” from four various vinyl GUTS editions
dropped digitally along with a fifth new song.
And of course she covered “Stick Season” by Noah Kahan, which I initially
wasn’t going to rank because it was just a live performance, but then that live
performance was put on a vinyl Record Store Day exclusive album. So I guess it
counts, huh?
That gives me eight new songs I need to place into the
Olivia Rodrigo rankings. And not only that… but you know what? Opinions can
change. That November 2023 ranking represents a time when I had listened to her
albums a handful of times versus now when I’ve listened to them approximately
37 trillion times.
So here’s what I’m going to do:
- With 8 new songs added to the original ranked 23, I know have a canonical list of 31 Olivia Rodrigo songs to rank. I will do just that.
- The 8 new songs will the same have fuller details and reviews, similar to the original November rankings, including Memorable Lyrics, Number of Swear Words (FUCK YEAH!), and an analysis.
- For the 23 songs I previously ranked, I won’t go into those full details again, but I will provide any brief follow-up thoughts months later, especially if my ranking of that song changed.
- Also for those initial 23 songs, I’ll track how much they changed in the rankings (or if it stayed the same). Note that the rise or fall will only be based on how it compares in rankings among the original 23. So my least favorite song would have been ranked 23 the last time around – but would be ranked 31 this time. If it’s the same song (spoiler: it is) then technically I could say it “fell 8 spots” from 23 to 31. But in actuality it didn’t. It’s where it was before, there are just new songs in the mix.
Anyway, here we go:
31. 1 step forward, 3 steps back (same ranking)
- Same ranking as before. Still my least favorite OR song. Rodrigo herself on her ongoing GUTS World Tour is playing every song from GUTS and all but two songs from SOUR – with this song being one of the ones she’s dropped from her set list.
- Same ranking as before. I’ve since watched some videos of her doing this live with an acoustic guitar, and I’ll admit it made me think about the position. Playing a guitar is SUPER COOL. She really puts a lot of emotion into it, and on tour says it’s her favorite song from SOUR. But the lyrics about prom queens and not being “exciting” or “interesting” enough made me realize that it belongs right here. You know, sometimes I’m simply just not going to relate to some song written by a 17-year-old girl going through heartbreak. Go figure!
29. hope ur ok (-1⬇️)
- Initially I thought I might rank “enough for you” above this. I did not. I’m not exactly sure what “address the letters to the holes in my butterfly wings” means, but it sounds a lot cooler than any lyrics in those bottom two. This is the other SOUR song that O-Rod left off the set list for her the GUTS World Tour.
- I’ll admit that this song has grown on me just a TINY little. Coming on GUTS right after “vampire” certainly helps me listen to it more often, when I’m listening to the album in order (which, I do, like, every day) and am too lazy to dig for my phone skip it. But for these rankings, that “growing on me” is only one spot. Lots of folks love this song. It’s not for me.
- Memorable Lyrics: “I'm here, I'm there, I'm everywhere / But you can't catch me now”
- Number of Swear Words: 0
- Analysis: I don’t dislike this song, but it barely feels like an OR song. Rather than being a deeply personal song like most of her songs, she takes herself out of her own shoes and sings a song from the POV of a movie character. Eh, this one just doesn’t hit me in the feels. It’s not bad. None of her songs are bad. It just feels like she made an okay song for a movie, which is exactly what she did. Also, no swear words. Lame. And why does this song title have uppercase letters? Lowercase letters only in song titles, Rodrigo! Those are the Rodrigo rules, and you should know because you made the Rodrigo rules.
26. pretty isn't pretty (-2⬇️)
- Again, I actually like this song. Being ranked 25/30, and it falling two spots from where it was initially ranked doesn’t mean I dislike it. There are great lyrics, I get what she’s going for here with the theme of societal pressures being thrown at women. Plus it has some solid trademark Rodrigo filthy language in it. Really this song didn’t “fall” in my rankings as much as other songs rose up. I feel exactly the same about it as I did in November. Solid song, but not the top of my playlist.
- I still sort of lump this song and “pretty isn’t pretty” together – even though they aren’t exactly about the same theme. As they’re linked in my head and in my preferences, they both dropped down 2 together as other songs moved up.
- Memorable Lyrics: “Well, I have captors I call friends / I got panic rooms inside my head”
- Number of Swear Words: 0
- Analysis: Lyrically, this secret track from GUTS (the purple vinyl edition that I bought, because of course I did) plays with some clever stuff. The “captors I call friends” are certainly reminiscent of, and most likely refer to the very same, “fair-weather friends” she gets drunk at the club with in “making the bed.” Personally, the lyrics and theme (I haven’t changed, but your expectations of me have) are great… but… I… I just can’t take that twang. I don’t know whether to call it “country” or “folk,” but it’s just not my cup of tea. What SoCal pop rock girl comes up with lyrics like “I get down with crooked men”? I mean Rodrigo is a genius singer-songwriter, has done Tiny Desk on NPR twice, played at Austin City Limits, covered Stick Season by Noah Kahan, etc… so the notion that she MIGHT have it in her to go a little country/folk was never an impossibility. I just don’t love it. If she re-arranged this as a rock song, or even as a more traditional pop song, I think it could love it. But once that little twang gets added… oh man… it gets rough for me. Oh, and by the way… the version released digitally on GUTS (spilled) is different than the secret track on the purple GUTS vinyl… and I honestly like the version on the vinyl better. Much less twangy. Might have been ranked higher without the twang.
23. Stick Season (🆕 Noah Kahan cover)
- Memorable Lyrics: “And it's half my fault, but I just like to play the victim / I'll drink alcohol 'til my friends come home for Christmas”
- Number of Swear Words: 0
- Analysis: Ok, this is a cover song and I initially didn’t initially include it when writing this. But as mentioned in the opening - it was released on vinyl and it did chart (along with Noah Kahan covering “lacy” on the B-side) and was the hottest selling album of RSD 2024, so I suppose it counts. Hard to rank it high as an Olivia Rodrigo song because it’s not her writing and it’s very tough to put it up against Kahan’s original iconic version which is still charting 2 years later. But such a great song and she does such a fantastic version of it. Kudos to Kahan for rhyming “half my fault” with “alcohol” because who the hell comes up with that kind of stuff? Great song and great cover. And honestly, as much as “lacy” isn’t my favorite either – Kahan’s flipside version is solid too.
- “teenage dream” takes the biggest plummet since my initial rankings. It was originally ranked 11 of 23, but has now fallen 6 down spots within those 23. Great song, but as I said before: it’s really a victim of me beginning to like other songs more, rather than me liking this song less. Also, in hindsight, the GUTS album crushed it and Rodrigo simply keeps getting better and better - so it’s hard to relate to some of this song’s worries about the future and whether she’ll still be thought of as any good. Still, when she wrote it only SOUR had come out… so a dread-filled song about the end of her teenage years and whether she’d only be remembered for her first album was a valid theme for a sophomore closing number.
- As I've been hinting to, other songs didn’t drop in my rankings as much songs like “happier” rose up. Like which songs though? THIS ONE. In my original ranking for this song, I said I love the pettiness in it. In those initial rankings I was overwhelmed by the vast number of acoustic, minimalist heartbreak ballads, so when OR turned to other themes on songs like “jealousy, jealousy” it was a refreshing break for me. But now all of those sad, angry, and petty heartbreak songs just feel like the purest form of Rodrigo to me. “happier” could have risen even higher, but the incredible “deja vu” is thematically similar enough to sort of relegate “happier” here. Still, a classic OR song and the one that she performed online which made producer Dan Nigro reach out to her and say “YOINK, let’s break you out from Disney. You’re coming to Geffen Records because you’re too good for that Mickey Mouse pop shit.” I presume that was the conversation. Maybe not those exact words. It was a great decision.
20. making the bed (-3⬇️)
- Sounding like a broken record, but same as with “teenage dream” and others. This fell three spots because my initial preferences tilted towards any song that wasn’t a heartbreak ballad… because they were wearing me out. Now? Now a bunch of those are on the “never skip” list. I still enjoy this song about Rodrigo’s disillusionment with sudden fame, and her self-critiquing / taking personal responsibility in situations when she knew better.
- Memorable Lyrics: “All I have is myself at the end of the day / But shouldn't that be enough for me?”
- Number of Swear Words: 0 (but to be fair… this is a Disney song)
- Analysis: “New” to this list, but in fact this is the OLDEST song ranked here. If she didn’t write this little ditty (which is far too damned good for a Disney mockumentary show about High School Musical), there would be no people going “holy shit, did this 16-year-old girl just write a song that is far too fucking good for a Disney mockumentary show?” and then she wouldn’t have been whisked away to Geffen Records as a singer-songwriter, and then she’d have never dropped “drivers license” on the world. That’s got to be worth something, right? In terms of the song itself? Yeah. Catchy. Cute. Even though it’s hypothetically from the perspective of a character she was playing on the show (or a character she was playing playing another character... meta) – the theme of moving on from past relationships is 100% Rodrigo gold. This song had “future star” written all over it, so I guess that “guy” at the beginning of this song was right.
- Memorable Lyrics: “You are the best thing that I'll ever keep so far out of my life”
- Number of Swear Words: 0
- Analysis: Love the lyrics and love the theme. Rodrigo has so many songs about heartbreak which imply she’s not quite over her ex’es… despite recognizing that they are liars and traitors (traitor), sociopaths (good 4 u), bloodsuckers and famefuckers (vampire), master manipulators (logical), weird second string losers (love is embarrassing), etc. But here in “stranger”? She’s moved on and is at peace, and it finally feels nice (so nice). In this song, she references making a pot of coffee and thinking back to all the stupid shit she did for “just some guy.” Compare that to “enough for you” where she also references making a coffee, but in terms of knowing how her guy likes it. Well now the coffee is all for her and fuck that guy. “stranger” is absolutely a “I’ve moved on from how I felt earlier” song and it’s a wonderful GUTS hidden (blue vinyl edition) and GUTS (spilled) deluxe track. My only issue? As with “girl i’ve always been”… just a little too much of that “folk” sound for my personal taste. Again, I could see how a more mainstream rock or pop arrangement could make this a solid single. Like “girl i’ve always been” I think the secret track version on the vinyl might be slightly different from the GUTS (spilled) 2024 release, but I don’t have that vinyl (yet), so I can’t judge it. Same for the next one.
17. scared of my guitar (🆕)
- Memorable Lyrics: “So I'll lay in your arms and pretend that it's love”
- Number of Swear Words: 0
- Analysis: Geez, what a harsh and bleak song, but then again this is Rodrigo so I want that. Rather than a song like “logical” about a gaslighting partner – OR is admitting to gaslighting herself here. She knows that she’s with the wrong guy, the relationship isn’t working, but she lies to herself and to everyone pretending she’s fine. Only when she picks up her guitar and writes songs can she finally admit the truth – hence being scared of said instrument (it’s not cursed or anything). This one was on the white vinyl version of GUTS before dropping on (spilled) and some of these lyrics just make you feel that relationship pain of feeling trapped in a situation where you want to leave but feel like you can’t do any better because “cause how could I ever / Trade somethin' that's good for what's right?”. She sings about barely being able to “sleep when you sleep next to me” in this song, and a similar set of words is also used on another (spilled) song – “so american,” which states “But man it's hard to sleep when he's with me.” And although notionally similar, here in this song the tone seems to imply she can’t sleep because she’s living in existential dread while trapped in an awful relationship, versus “so american” where I’m pretty sure the lyrics imply “lol can’t sleep cuz we fuck so much.” If I were to create a “lifecycle of an Olivia Rodrigo” relationship timeline – this song is set during a shitty relationship, which predates the themes of most songs which are set after relationships are over and she’s in a miserable and broken state. Fortunately, we now know from “stranger” that she will eventually reach that “and now I’ve moved on and am happy” stage… so I guess good 4 her.
16. logical (same ranking)
- logical winds up ranked in the same place it was before in comparison to the initial 23 songs I ranked. Didn’t rise, didn’t fall. Good song. Love the anger and sarcasm that bleeds through it. The words “master manipulator” make for such an iconic opening. Also I'm a big fan of doing math incorrectly - that's probably the most common thing my own teenage years had with OR's lyrics.
15. ballad of a homeschooled girl (-3⬇️)
- Still love the witty and fun lyrics in this rock-forward song, all about embarrassment and self-cringe. But then again, its cringe isn’t as great as the cringe of “love is embarrassing,” so there’s that. As with others I’ve mentioned, this one did not fall three spots as much as three other songs simply jumped. I’ll talk about those soon enough, after covering another new GUTS (spilled) entry…
14. so american (🆕)
- Memorable Lyrics: “Oh, God, I'm gonna marry him / If he keeps this shit up”
- Number of Swear Words: 2 (shit x 2)
- Analysis: Well, here we finally have it guys. After 31 Olivia Rodrigo songs… the newest and final bonus track song off of GUTS (spilled) is the very first one that is actually a HAPPY LOVE SONG. This is the only one in her entire released discography. She’s presently in a relationship with a guy. It’s happy. It’s healthy. She might just be in lo-lo-lo-lo-lo-lo-lo-lo-lo-lo-lo-love. And although she refuses to ever confirm what or who any of her songs are about (famously answering “ur mom” if asked) – since she’s dating that British actor dude from Enola Holmes, it doesn’t exactly take a rocket scientist to figure out which man she might be in love with and who calls her “so American.” Although I gotta say… if “deja vu” was meant to criticize her ex for doing all the things with his new girl that he used to do with her, the fact that Rodrigo sings “He says I'm pretty wearin' his clothes” means that SHE TOO is also recycling the same things they she used to do with her ex (trading jackets / laughing 'bout how small it looks on you). So, I mean, like… her ex could legitimately “deja vu” her right back about how now she’s the one who shouldn’t “act like we didn't do that shit too.” ANYWAY…I’m legitimately happy for her. I wish her all the best and hope it is true love and she has a long, successful relationship and life with him. Buuuuut… and I’m certainly not wishing anything bad at all… BUT BUT BUT if things don’t work out and start to go… SOUR?… I mean… think of all the amazing music that she will create. Not that she can’t also create happy music, but COME ON. I’ll enjoy this one happy Olivia Rodrigo love song, but let’s not make this a habit. I NEED that angst, anger, bitterness, and sadness. Hey, and speaking of which…
- Welcome to all killer, no filler. Songs 13 and above are all 100% on my “never skip” list. I’ll listen to these all the time. Every day. Maybe multiple times a day. “traitor” took the biggest jump in my rankings, rising 6 spots when compared to the original 23 songs (where it had initially been a lowly #18). Going from an initial ranking of 18 out of 23 to its current position of 13 out of 31 is like an MLB batter rising from a .217 batting average to a .419 batting average. That’s like going from the Mendoza line to Rogers Hornsby (look, I’m aware that the Venn Diagram of “Olivia Rodrigo Fans” and “people who make old baseball stat references” has very small overlap… but that’s the exact spot where I land). When I first ranked this song, I was not particularly enthralled by what I called “slow, piano-based, minimalist heartbreak ballads.” I was wrong. I fucking love this sad, angry song. And it’s actually not so minimalist. A lot going on in it. I cannot believe I used to skip it because I didn’t want to hear “that little Mexican girl who be crying all the time” again. Now? Now I’m that dude who will just scream out at random times “YOU BETRAYYYYYED ME!”
- When I first ranked this song, I said I “kinda dig this one.” It had already been on the rise in my head after the first couple of times I heard it, and it’s only continued to rise in the songs I love since then. Especially when she hits the last chorus and just starts howling ALL THE THINGS I DID!!!!!!! FYI I’m typing this with one hand because the other is waving a lighter in the air right now. Or cell phone, I guess, right? They use cell phones now at concerts to wave around because it’s 2024.
11. the grudge (-1⬇️)
- It hurts me that “the grudge” fell one spot. I debated this one. At first it fell down one and then I said “screw that and screw you too” and pushed it back up. But then I thought deep and hard about what I would eventually rank as #10 and reluctantly dropped “the grudge” down. Which sucks because I love it so much. Fantastic song and I feel like there are days it could be #1 for me. Some people think it’s another song about a shitty boyfriend. Some people think it’s about Taylor Swift being a giant cunt (it’s far more likely that this is about Ms. Kelce than “vampire” is). Chances are it’s about a lot of different things because, you know, songwriters can do that and write a song about more than one thing. Obviously if you ask her she’ll say it’s about “ur mom,” but in the end I guess the listeners all get to make their own meanings. I think about the brilliance of the 30-ish seconds of rapid gunfire lyrics in this song between “The arguments that I have won against you in my head…” and “…But, man, those cuts were never equal” all the time.
In my original ranking I literally said these stupid fucking words, and I quote my own dumb fucking self: “sort of surprising that this was the particular minimalist ballad about heartbreak that launched her career because this album is loaded with minimalist heartbreak ballads and this song doesn’t stand out to me as particularly above some of the others.” Fortunately, right after that I also said, “What the fuck do I know though?” At least I was right with that second part. I made a call in that first ranking, and it was the wrong call. But I get it now. You can excuse me for not fully “getting it” at first. I was most certainly not the target audience for this song about a naïve young girl being absolutely devastated by the end of her relationship like it was the end of the world. Somehow the phenomenon of this song never reached me during it’s original run, and I never even heard about OR until “good 4 u” dropped months later. January 2021? Was probably a little too worried about a fucking fascist coup to overthrow the United States to bother keeping up on Billboard charts. But every time I hear this song again, I understand a little bit more why this is the song that exploded her career, dominated the Hot 100 for 8 weeks, and broke a bajillion records. Mea culpa. All in all with these re-rankings, a lot of SOUR songs are doing a lot better. The first time I ranked, I underappreciated SOUR. This time? Notsomuch.
Wheeeee!
9. love is embarrassing (same ranking)
- This one also sits exactly where it sat before on the pantheon of Rodrigo songs. It’s 8 swear words and additional blasphemous lyrics still make it technically the most lyrically vulgar song, which is AWESOME. Like with the newer “stranger,” Rodrigo has moved on from a toxic relationship and is so over it, but in a fun and self-deprecating way.
- Like “the grudge,” it sucks that “bad idea right?” had to fall down. I do not love this song any less. It’s just that my reassessment of SOUR made me love other songs more. Great song, great music video. How can you not like a song about messy girls making absolutely terrible decisions? GUTS is a fantastic album and this track is such a great song. Just like it’s sister song, which fell with it…
7. get him back! (-3⬇️)
- Same as before. Technically fell but I still love it just as much. Rodrigo uses this as her show closer on her GUTS World Tour, which is absolutely the right decision. It’s fun, it’s witty, it’s sarcastic, it’s a banger. I wanna go out and key someone’s car and upper cut them right fucking now every time I hear this. It feels crazy to me that it’s “only” ranked #7 now because this song is amazing.
- Memorable Lyrics: “You both have moved on / You don't even talk / But I can't help it / I got issues / I can't help it, baby”
- Number of Swear Words: 1 (Fuckin’)
- Analysis: The final of the new entrants to the list, and which Rodrigo dropped as her latest single with a new music video, despite not initially appearing on GUTS until the deluxe (spilled) edition (other than as a hidden track on the red vinyl version). This song kicks ass and is so good. It clearly deserved to be on the album, so it must have been intentionally left off specifically so that the deluxe release would have a certified hit single. Rodrigo had this on her live playlist for her GUTS World Tour before (spilled) dropped, which only drove up interest for it more and more. And if you thought the lyrics to “lacy” and/or the music video for “deja vu” were perhaps “slightly sapphic,” then OH WOW the lyrics to this one go way beyond slightly. And a nice call back reference to “all-american bitch” with the lips/hips thing here. Or potentially not a callback if this was an earlier-written song that sat on the shelf for a while (which seems to be the case). As always, fans speculate which boyfriend and which boyfriend’s ex this is about (although the “I’ve seen every movie she's been in” lyric gives us a good hint that it’s an actress) but more important than that is that this song rocks. I initially thought about placing it at #3 until, well, I re-examined my thoughts on SOUR…
5. good 4 u (same ranking)
- This is the first Olivia Rodrigo song that I ever heard, and was the first Olivia Rodrigo music video I ever saw. I watched it, thought it was fine, and then proceeded to not really think a whole lot about Olivia Rodrigo songs until GUTS came out two years later. Only after “vampire” did I go back and more fully appreciate her and start listening to everything. This cool fucking rock song (it’s a rock song, don’t question it) will always hold a special place in my heart.
- In my initial ranking, where this came it at #6 I said, “Honestly, I love this song so much I keep thinking to myself ‘it can't possibly be all the way down at #6... it HAS to be ranked higher!’” I was correct. I’ve now leap-frogged it over my previously favorite SOUR song, “good 4 u”, as well as some absolute bangers from GUTS. “brutal” is great. From what I understand it was one of the last songs written for SOUR, and it absolutely serves as a preamble to the album. Her lyrics are like a brief overview of everything you’re going to be hearing on the upcoming songs, so, like, get ready. What a way for her first song on her first album to start. I sort of always knew this one would move up and it did. It is a snappy, fast, 2 minutes and 23 seconds of angst, insecurity, and sloppy distorted guitars. “I want it to be, like, messy” indeed.
3. deja vu (+5⬆️)
- When I first started re-ranking, this had the same ranking as before. But I needed to be honest with myself… I LOVE THIS SONG. Deliciously spiteful lyrics towards her ex’s new relationship. Banger. Great verses. Great chorus. Epic bridge. Zero notes. SOUR is such a better album than I initially thought it was, and up until a few seconds ago I still placed “brutal” above this until I flipped the two. Even though “brutal” is a more rockin song that I should like more… “deja vu” is the song on SOUR I most hit replay on. Mostly because of the pettiness. SO. DAMNED. PETTY.
2. all-american bitch (same ranking)
- Same spot it was before: #2. I don’t know what else I can say that I didn’t say last time about this song. The lyrics from front to end are fast-paced, relentless, and witty. Seeing videos of her doing this song live on tour are incredible, and this song kills it every time. For live versions, she’s also replaced the lyric “perfect All-american hips” with “perfect All-american tits,” going back to an initial version of the lyrics that the studio had told her to maybe calm down a little with because she was maybe swearing TOO much (obviously that’s wrong). Sometimes I think this song could jump to #1 with how good it is. But that’s not happening today.
1. vampire (same ranking)
- This is still the best Olivia Rodrigo song, and it is still awesome for all the reasons I said last time. I still keep seeing articles that are like “OMG this is about Taylor Swift” which is dumb because it’s clearly written about an ex-boyfriend. Like, are you even listening to the lyrics? It’s more “rock opera” than “rock,” but the lines are incredible and the song itself hits all the marks with how it slowly builds and builds and builds. Stairway to Heaven. Bohemian Rhapsody. November Rain. Purple Rain. “vampire” is up there with them all in terms of “oh shit, what an incredible song progression,” I’m not kidding. I said what I said. It should be mentioned with those songs.
