Sour-too?
Two years after the release of Olivia Rodrigo’s seminal debut album, Sour, its runaway success has set the expectations for Guts impossibly high. Make no mistake, though Guts sounds and feels very much like Sour, Rodrigo has made sure to crank everything that made Sour great to eleven with spades of attitude to spare.
Right from the get-go, Olivia’s sharp production shines in the first track, “all-american bitch”. From the acoustic arpeggios that lead the song to her shouty and distorted vocals and the crunchy guitars that carry the chorus. The production highlights a renewed focus on a more pop-punk-centric approach. On “all-american bitch”, Olivia paints a self-portrait of herself navigating the complexities and contradictions rife in American femalehood, where she sings about her image of being a marketable American star, yet being emotionally unstable and ruminating on the darker aspects of adolescence. The song then seamlessly transitions into “bad idea right” with a groovy drum beat and bassline leading the song where Olivia sings about making poor decisions with her ex. The infectious energy of the refrain of “My brain goes ah” and the pre-chorus “Seeing you tonight / It’s a bad idea right” coupled with the distorted vocals and strong chorus makes the song an undeniable bop. The album then tones the energy down with her duo of ballads, the lead single, “vampire” and “lacy”. “vampire” begins with a simple piano line as producer Dan Nigro slowly ramps up the tempo and breaks into a pounding electric guitar bridge in the last act. With the tempo and volume cranked up, the song switches the theme from lamenting one’s past love to Rodrigo chastising her ex, forcefully asserting her self in this cathartic journey of emancipation. The song demonstrates Rodrigo and Nigro’s chemistry and willingness to experiment sonically. The personal highlight of Guts for me would be the song “lacy”. The song tells a tale of her obsession with the mysterious character “lacy”, interplaying with the feelings of inadequacy and hopelessness when with her. The dreamy production is cut through with Rodrigo’s harsh lyricism. Her hauntingly beautiful and delicate voice in the song accentuates the pain of inadequacy and highlights her emotional vulnerability in the song. These moments of masterful song production and songwriting highlight Rodrigo and Nigro’s penchant for sonic arrangements.
Ballads, oh, ballads
Disappointingly, the second half of the album fails to live up to the energy and creativity displayed on the opening tracks. Despite having decent songwriting and good production, some of Rodrigo’s ballads on Guts fail to impress. The platitudes of ballads that ensue such as “making the bed” and “logical” are by no means bad on their own, but lack identity amid songs that display much more sonic maturity. However, despite the middling second half, Rodrigo is still able to pull some hits out of her pocket. The fuzzy backing track in “get him back” and electrifying shouts of “I want to get him back” on the chorus sound like a pop-banger released by Avril Lavigne in the early 2000s with a psychedelic twinge.
Nothing’s forever
Initially, when Rodrigo released her trio of singles (“vampire”, “bad idea right?” and “get him back!), I was sceptical on whether the album would surpass Sour in terms of quality. Despite the high quality of all three singles, they did not mark that significant of a departure of style from Sour. However, with the release of Guts, Rodrigo has surpassed all my expectations and showcased much more sonic depth than the three singles had shown me. More importantly, in an age where artists use pop-punk as more of an aesthetic direction (think MGK and, ironically, Green Day), Rodrigo has truly executed the formula with much style and, more importantly, fun! Her sardonic humour, sharp songwriting and self-awareness with lines like “But I am my father’s daughter, so maybe I could fix him” on “get him back!” make this record an undeniably fun listen.
Rodrigo wants you to know that she’s a rock-star, albeit an unstable and confused one, with much growing to do as she sings in “teenage dream” where she leaves her listeners in suspense as the song unravels in a Rodrigo-worthy crescendo where she questions “They all say that it gets better, but what if I don’t”. Amidst all the uncertainty in growing up, Guts doesn’t give any clear answers on Olivia’s future, but for now, it’s hard to imagine anywhere but up for her.