It’s by no means simple for pop stars to introduce their subsequent period. If they cling too carefully to what has been accomplished up to now, critics could grumble over a scarcity of innovation. If they veer too removed from what followers know and anticipate, they threat shedding the bottom that gave them a platform within the first place. For Olivia Rodrigo, the brand new “You Seem Pretty Sad for a Girl so in Love” period has largely relied on — as she sings within the lead single, “drop dead” — her personal female instinct.
The 23-year-old’s third studio album, launched this month, ushers in maybe probably the most thrilling part of her profession but, one the place each her fashion and sound are maturing in tandem.
The 13-track document chronicles the lifespan of a relationship, from the exuberance of preliminary infatuation to the whiplash of begging for affection from a accomplice that was as soon as so simply enamored. It’s already earned Rodrigo her third consecutive No. 1 on the Billboard 200 albums chart. She saved the momentum going Monday with the announcement of Daisy Chain Fields, a brand new music pageant that includes an all-women lineup — together with Chappell Roan, Doechii, Bikini Kill and Katseye — with proceeds going in the direction of girls advocacy organizations. The occasion takes after Lilith Fair, the groundbreaking ‘90s feminist pageant based by Sarah McLachlan, who will even make a particular visitor look, together with Stevie Nicks and Karen O.
Rodrigo’s earlier two albums,“Sour” (2021) and “Guts” (2023), have been industry-shakers in their very own proper. Songs like “Drivers License” and “Vampire” demonstrated her expertise for writing breakup ballads, whereas hits like “Good 4 U” and “Get Him Back” showcased her proficiency in ‘90s punk rock — an arena of music which has become her signature sonic playground. Up until now, Rodrigo’s fashion mirrored that musical predilection, with the singer’s rotation of plaid miniskirts and platform boots usually touchdown as a hybrid combine between Gwen Stefani and Cher Horowitz. Rodrigo’s eras have clearly outlined colour palettes too; her first two albums have been synonymous with a spunky purple hue, whereas “You Seem Pretty Sad” has subtly shifted to a definitively girly powdery pink.
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If the job of a debut album is to introduce an artist to the world, whereas a sophomore album reinforces their status, then a 3rd album gives a channel for artists to increase past the acquainted methods and peculiarities that shot them to fame within the first place. In Rodrigo’s case, “You Seem Pretty Sad” largely ditches the pop punk and alt-rock references and, as an alternative, borrows sounds that outlined the ‘80s. Think New Order, or post-punk flourishes from The Cure (the English band’s frontman, Robert Smith, even makes an look on the album’s B-side observe, “What’s Wrong with Me”). Rodrigo’s wardrobe naturally adopted go well with.
Her deft use of style through the “You Seem Pretty Sad” rollout does greater than enable Rodrigo to play gown up — it additionally features as a car for her artistry. Gone are the Mary Jane Dr. Martens and schoolgirl plaid skirts. Working with sister stylist duo Chloe and Chenelle Delgadillo, Rodrigo has reconstructed her signature appears to be like to really feel softer and extra grown-up, with outfits drawing from style references simply as numerous as her musical style.
The new album “ends up pulling a little bit from ‘80s new wave, but her look isn’t really going ‘80s new wave,” stated music journalist Brittany Spanos of Rodrigo’s evolving sound and elegance. “Whereas she’s been pulling from grungier ‘90s looks for her last two album cycles, this one she expanded more into the hyper femme versions of it.”
To form this period’s “femme palette,” Rodrigo has worn a mixture of shift attire harking back to ‘60s mod, ballet flats from the ‘70s-founded shoe brand Repetto, Y2K-style jeans paired with peep-toe heels, and modern riffs on the twee aesthetic. The music video for the album’s first single, “Drop Dead,” featured Rodrigo in two outfits: a reproduction of a crochet gown that Jane Birkin wore within the 1975 French movie, “Catherine & Co,” and a pink-and-blue nightgown set from Chloé’s pre-fall 2026 assortment — the latter of which appears to be like prefer it may have been taken straight from the costume division of Sofia Coppola’s “Marie Antoinette.”
“I think Olivia knows how to work a reference in a more profound sense than many pop stars,” stylist and developments spokesperson at social purchasing app Depop, Gabriella Karefa-Johnson, stated over e-mail. (Depop serves as one of many official companions of Rodrigo’s Daisy Chain Fields.) “When I think about her boho, and early aughts, and Jane Birkin nods, what is clear to me is that there is no real aesthetic throughline. The reference is more a state of being and a message of liberation — these are all aesthetics that connote women at their wildest and most free. That’s what her music is about, so why not also look that way?”
Rodrigo’s current wardrobe contributes to the album’s worldbuilding, however her new fashion hasn’t been shaped in a vacuum, both. “She knows how young people are dressing right now — she is one!” Karefa-Johnson stated.
In the final three months alone, Depop searches for babydoll attire have elevated by 144%, Y2K low- rise denims by 102%, and peep toe heels by 108%, in keeping with the platform. Rodrigo’s different beloved developments, like classic mod and indie sleaze, are additionally on the rise on the location.
But the connection between Rodrigo’s wardrobe selections and this yr’s pattern cycles can be symbiotic.
“You can’t really have the history of popular music without the history of fashion,” Spanos stated. “It’s completely braided together. Artists, genres and things like music eras have always influenced and formed trends in fashion, and vice versa.”
Then the babydoll-sized elephant walked into the room.
Shortly after Rodrigo launched her new album’s lead single, the pop star discovered herself on the middle of a media maelstrom. A puff-sleeved babydoll gown she wore onstage throughout a Spotify live performance in Barcelona noticed some on social media accused Rodrigo of selling a hypersexualized childlike aesthetic. Public outrage over how a feminine pop star attire has, after all, recurred lengthy earlier than Rodrigo turned a family identify. The previous few many years noticed related levels of vitriol lobbed towards the likes of Miley Cyrus, Britney Spears and Christina Aguilera.
Rodrigo pushed again towards the outcry in an interview with the New York Times in May. Her outfit was harking back to feminist riot grrrl “heroes” Kathleen Hanna and Courtney Love, she stated, including, “You shouldn’t be responsible for some guy sexualizing you in some way that was never your intention.”
“I think some of the confusion was a feeling of disconnect between the sound and look,” stated Spanos, who wrote in regards to the controversy in an essay for The Cut. While the tone and material of “You Seem Pretty Sad” could not precisely emulate the punk social commentary discovered within the discography of Rodrigo’s riot grrrl heroes, the babydoll gown nonetheless performs a job in how she needs to characterize this new chapter of her profession. “There’s a softness and a vulnerability,” stated Spanos of Rodrigo’s newest album, that led her to “embrace these femme silhouettes and structures that have a little bit of an edge to them.”
Independent music critic Molly Mary O’Brien famous how the early-to-mid-’90s interval that produced the unique iteration of pop-punk style, and the present second Rodrigo now operates inside, are vastly totally different. “We have this very long lineage of female musicians subverting sexual expectations or just expectations of femininity,” O’Brien stated. “It’s almost a symbol of how far women in the music industry have come, in a sense, that in the ‘90s grunge was an alternative movement that went mainstream. I feel like Rodrigo is maybe signifying this in her clothing… There is this continual push-pull between alternative and mainstream that she’s almost trying to thread the needle with.”
The approach celebrities make use of style references of their wardrobes is not any accident, stated Karefa-Johnson. “We need to be thinking critically and engaging with the complexity beneath the visual surface of a trend or reference,” she added. “The most compelling fashion references use history as a point of departure — they create friction by rubbing the future against the past. A reference shouldn’t be a blueprint but rather a jumping off point from which to explore something new.”
Rodrigo follows within the footsteps of different pop juggernauts who use sartorial Easter eggs to tease new musical eras. While Taylor Swift usually will get credit score for popularizing the notion of period reinventions, artists have performed with their visuals to speak and market new album cycles for many years — simply have a look at Beyoncé, Madonna, David Bowie and The Beatles.
The broad style of pop additionally offers artists room to experiment, stated O’Brien, including that audiences today are properly conscious of the idea of eras and perceive artists will undergo a number of ones all through their careers.
“The easier you can describe something, the easier it is you can sell it,” O’Brien stated. “America loves a teen pop star, and then we love ripping them to shreds when they have any sign of agency or autonomy… The times change, but there is that impulse to keep questioning the integrity of young female performers.”
If something, the dichotomy between the pop star who prances round Versailles in a sheer nightie and the pop star who stomps onstage in knee-high fight boots feels fully genuine and intentional. Just like the 2 halves of “You Seem Pretty Sad,” Rodrigo’s wardrobe performs with the skinny threshold between falling in love and breaking your coronary heart.