As the release of Olivia Rodrigo’s debut album Sour looms as one of the only massive pop releases of the year thanks to the massive success of “Drivers License,” the cover stories are going to be stacking up like hotcakes. Today, we have Billboard‘s take on describing the rise of a Disney actress to purveyor of a viral pop hit, and her uh, eclectic outfits in the photos alone are worth a click. The story follows a lot of what we already know about Olivia, that she’s obsessed with music, that Taylor Swift has already written her a letter (and we now know that Olivia wrote one back), and new tidbits like the fact that her label execs are thrilled with her work ethic. (“I honestly don’t think she sleeps,” says Nicole Bilzerian, executive VP at Geffen.)
But one of the cutest details of the piece is a more personal one. It wasn’t the early TikTok crossover of her first song, “All I Want” that tipped off Olivia to the idea that “Drivers License” might be a smash, but instead, the reaction of her dad the first time she played it for him. Opting to play iit for him for the first time in the most ideal environment, in the car, she noticed tears streaming down his face as the song went on: “I could just see the tears under his sunglasses — and I like, never see my dad cry, ever,” she remembered. “I was like, ‘Oh, OK, maybe I did something here.’”
A pop song that can unite teen girls and dads alike? That’s exactly the kind of hit we deserve in 2021.
Read the full cover story here.