Olivia Rodrigo

Olivia Rodrigo is a 19 year old American singer/songwriter and actress. I am not very familiar with her work (by that I mean that I have no idea who she is), but her music ranges from straight pop to pop punk.

I came across her video for ‘Brutal’ on youtube recently. I forget what I was searching for, but it wasn’t her. I may have been searching for the UK pop punk duo of Shampoo. The search engine on youtube doesn’t seem to work very well for me. Most of the time, it seems to search for what they want me to find, not what I’m looking for.

Anyways, I came across her video and was fascinated (I say while raising my Spock eyebrow). It made me wince and laugh out loud. I haven’t bought her album, yet, but I’m thinking about it. In the meantime, I’ve enjoyed these two videos of her pop punk songs. I especially enjoy the female punk attitude and humor (at least, I hope it’s humor) in her lyrics and the videos.

These are both from her 2021 debut album ‘Sour’. ⚠️ Warning of explicit lyrics.

Good 4 U

Brutal

Highly recommended, if brutal.

Checking the Time

Now you’re checking the time
As if you have someplace important to be
And you say it is nothing
But it means something to me

There is no reason to hurry dear
The last grain of sand has already run out
Looking back now I can only wonder
What was our relationship all about?

We were always almost connecting
While busily going on our separate ways
Our fate was to keep crossing paths
Caught in a Hallmark drama full of cliches

There was something missing and left unsaid
Despite all the intimacy that was secretly shared
The countless times love was openly declared
Now we know just how much we really cared

the weak and wayward ones

Theatrical masks of Tragedy and Comedy. Mosaic, Roman artwork, 2nd century CE. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

we, the weak and wayward ones were once raised
with the same understanding of honor, duty and love
but when facing the time of two and a half smiles
we find it easier to escape from the reality of

for it takes strength to walk in the face of the hardships and sorrows
along the difficult path that will inconvenience oneself
and to be filled foremost with compassion, caring and empathy
and to think first of others before self

sadly, weakness is a common theme to our tragic play
for it is so much easier for us to turn the other way
and pretend that it never really happened
and to move on and believe that it all is just okay