Let me tell you (yes I am shaking a figurative cane in the air) if Olivia Rodrigo was around when I was in high school (graduated in 2008), I would have been OBSESSED. I mean, I think she’s so great even in my 30’s, but her music would have hit so much differently when I was a teenager. I would have been feral for her music.
High school was when I started writing my own songs and performing them around my school. I could totally see Olivia Rodrigo influencing my early songwriting and changing my creative trajectory a bit (I already listened to a lot of the influences she mentions, like PJ Harvey in particular, but having a girl my age releasing that stuff at the time would have motivated me with my own music in a different way).
Having said that … instead of Olivia Rodrigo, in high school my thing was Rilo Kiley (and Jenny Lewis’ solo stuff). They were my FAVORITE and a lot of my early songwriting (and late/current songwriting) can reflect that. And honestly, I’m totally okay with that. More than okay. Rilo Kiley was PERFECT for high-school-me (and is still one of my all-time faves).
I do sometimes imagine going back in time to give high-school-me an Olivia Rodrigo album though… I just know I would wear that CD into the GROUND. Print out all the lyrics and analyze them between classes and on my lunch break. Cover her songs at benefit concerts for Amnesty International that my school always had me play at. Play her songs on the school radio station in the basement where I’d hang out with friends for lunch. Cover one of her songs for the Battle of the Bands I won my senior year (instead we did a Byrds song, a Wanda Jackson song, and 2 originals).
I was so hungry for new music constantly.
