After a summer of anticipation and the release of two singles, Olivia Rodrigo’s sophomore album, “Guts,” has been finally released. It’s been two years since Rodrigo’s hit debut, “Sour,” and fans were excited to see how her next album would compare.
When the album was released on Sept. 8th, fans were shocked at the complete sonic and thematic shift from her previous work. “Sour” mostly consisted of lyrical ballads and songs about heartbreak, while “Guts” is a charismatic, punk-rock album that sounds like it could be the soundtrack of an early 2000s chick-flick.
The album opens with the song “All American B*tch” where Rodrigo captures the rage that many teenage girls experience. She ends the song with her own frustrated screams before mellowing down to say “I’m grateful all the time/ I’m sexy and I’m kind/ I’m pretty when I cry.”
She embodies the frustration many young women feel having to adjust to make the people around them comfortable and having to fulfill the expectation for them to be perfect and pretty at such a young age. “All American B*tch” introduces the overarching theme of the album: the struggles and complexities of the teenage experience.
Musically, the album consists of harsh guitar, drums and a purposefully chaotic composition of music that perfectly captures the emotion that Rodrigo sings about. Despite having “ballad” in the name, “Ballad of a Homeschool Girl” is anything but one. The background instrumentation skillfully matches the chaos that occurs in the mind of a young girl. Being homeschooled and a child actress, Rodrigo never got to have a typical teenage experience. With “Guts”, she can have the experience that she never got to live.
The main focus of this album is to show Rodrigo’s new style, but something that stays similar to her last album is her stunning lyricism and ability to capture emotions. This can be seen in songs like “Lacy” where Rodrigo beautifully depicts the emotion of being so jealous of a seemingly perfect girl that it hurts.
Another standout song that showcases beautiful lyricism is “The Grudge,” which portrays how impossible it feels to let go of someone even after the relationship has become toxic. She also describes falling into toxicity herself while trying to keep the relationship afloat.
In contrast to Rodrigo’s emotional songs, the album consists of many upbeat and angsty songs that portray a more playful side of the teenage experience. In her single “Bad Idea Right?” Rodrigo sings about knowingly making bad decisions just for the sake of doing it. She uses her vocals and instrumentals to portray her inner monologue debating whether making that decision would be wrong, but ultimately doing it anyway.
In “Get Him Back!” She experiments with a storytelling approach depicting a hilarious and descriptive story of wanting to get back together with a boy she doesn’t like that much. She describes it as wanting to,”meet his mom just to tell her her son sucks.”
Rodrigo ends the album with the emotional ballad “Teenage Dream”. In the chorus of this song, Rodrigo sings, “Got your whole life ahead of you, you’re only nineteen / But I fear they already got the best parts of me.”
This lyric showcases that although teen years are simultaneously chaotic, thrilling and painful, many girls would think them to be one of the most fun and memorable years of their lives. Rodrigo portrays the terrifying reality that growing up is inevitable, and that being a lovestruck, angsty teen doesn’t last forever.
“Guts” is a massive hit for Rodrigo, having peaked on the billboard charts in the first week, and outselling the rest of the top ten billboard charts combined. The music videos for “Guts,” which matched the early 2000’s high school movie album aesthetic, were also incredible hits.
This album portrayed how well-rounded Rodrigo’s music is. Jumping from punk to pop to rock, Rodrigo produced an album that will go down in history for how it perfectly captures the roller coaster that is the mind of a teenage girl.
