Olivia Rodrigo recently sat down for a chat with Alanis Morissette, for Rolling Stone‘s current “Musicians On Musicians” series. The two are a natural pairing, given that they both started their careers as child actors before releasing massively successful debut albums (Morissette’s Jagged Little Pill was technically her third album, but it was her first to be released outside of Canada). That said, Sour and Jagged Little Pill had two very different releases, as Sour came out during the pandemic, when in-person promotional opportunities were few and far between.
However, that’s a process Rodrigo enjoyed, as she told Morissette, “I honestly loved it. I put out my first song, which did really well, and I didn’t expect any of that sort of success so early on. I think had I not just been doing the same thing that I had always been doing and writing songs in my bedroom, maybe I would have gotten a little more in my head about it than I did.”
Rodrigo also noted how her ascent to global superstardom felt quick: “We had a similar experience, where we had a really successful debut album, which is weird. At least for me, it felt super-quick. It felt overnight, and I’ve been working and writing songs since I was five years old. It definitely wasn’t overnight. But the ‘I’m writing songs in my bedroom’ to ‘Oh, my gosh, lots of people know this song’ was really quick for me. I feel obviously so lucky, but sometimes it just feels like it doesn’t have to do with me.”
Check out the full conversation here.