Olivia Rodrigo talks about the invasive side of fame

Olivia Rodrigo Opens Up About Love, Fame and Finding Purpose Through Daisy Chain Fields

Olivia Rodrigo is finding new meaning in a career built around deeply personal songs, with her latest album and Daisy Chain Fields festival giving her more ways to connect with fans.

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At 23, the singer has already experienced the sudden success of “Drivers License”, the pressure of following Sour, and the demands of becoming an arena headliner. Her third album, You Seem Pretty Sad for a Girl So in Love, explores how relationships change, while her women-led charity festival has helped her reconsider what fame can make possible.

Rodrigo discussed songwriting, privacy, the musicians who inspire her and her hopes for a life that leaves room for experiences beyond performing.

Her answers reveal an artist who remains optimistic about love, even when her songs describe its most painful moments.

Daisy Chain Fields Gave Olivia Rodrigo a Different Perspective on Success

Creating Daisy Chain Fields involved much more than preparing another headline performance. Rodrigo spent a year and a half developing the festival, bringing together artists from different generations for an event supporting women-centred organisations.

Held at Great Park in Irvine, California, the festival attracted 50,000 people and raised $20 million for causes including Planned Parenthood, the National Women’s Law Center and Baby2Baby, according to the original feature.

For Rodrigo, the presence of relatives, friends and musical heroes made the occasion unusually personal.

“It felt like it was my wedding a little bit,” she said.

“Everyone that I ever met in my life was there. My whole family on both sides,” Rodrigo explained. “I planned it for a year and a half. I was joking about it to Alanis [Morissette], and she looks at me and she says: ‘This is more important than your wedding.’ I was like, ‘Oh, wow,’ and I just suddenly got a wave of nervousness. But, yeah, it was special.”

Sharing the stage with Stevie Nicks, Sarah McLachlan and Morissette added to the significance of the event. These were artists whose work had helped shape her own understanding of music, now taking part in something she had organised.

There was little time to pause afterwards. With an 86-date arena tour approaching at the time of the interview, rehearsals were already taking priority.

The pace also affects her sense of home.

“The blessing and the curse of my job is that I don’t really live anywhere — I’m never in a place longer than two or three months.”

How a Breakup Changed Her Third Album

You Seem Pretty Sad for a Girl So in Love follows a relationship through attraction, closeness, uncertainty and separation.

Songs including “Drop Dead”, “Honeybee”, “Purple”, “Less” and “Expectations” occupy different points along that emotional journey. The finished record has a clear direction, but Rodrigo said that its shape emerged during the writing process.

Initially, she had been working on more conventional love songs. That changed “when I went through a breakup”.

With roughly two or three months remaining to complete the album, Rodrigo and longtime collaborator Dan Nigro returned to existing material and wrote further songs. Rather than treating happiness and sadness as separate subjects, they explored the moments when both feelings exist within the same relationship.

“What’s Wrong With Me”, which features Robert Smith, became one example of how a song could acquire a different meaning.

“What’s Wrong With Me,” for example, was originally about “being in love with this person so much that I’m crazy. Then, post-breakup, you change perspective,” Rodrigo said. “It becomes, ‘Oh, I’m depressed and it’s because this relationship isn’t serving me anymore.’ That was a fun challenge. When you’re young, you just write and write and write. Editing has been something I’ve had to learn to do as I’ve become more of a quote-unquote professional songwriter.”

That willingness to revise gives a clearer picture of her working process. Writing down an immediate feeling is one stage; deciding how that feeling belongs within a complete album requires another set of choices.

Robert Smith Praises Her Commitment to Songwriting

The Cure frontman Robert Smith became the first guest artist to feature on a Rodrigo album, contributing vocals to “What’s Wrong With Me”.

His comments focused on the care she takes with her work and the speed at which ideas can arrive.

“Olivia’s desire to be recognized as a songwriter is very refreshing; it’s unmodern in a way,” Smith said.

“It’s not effortless — she spends an awful lot of time getting things right with her music,” he continued. “But she also gets it right so quickly. It’s bizarre at times. She was in London with me a while back. She played me something she wrote that morning, things that could take 14 years for many writers to get out, and she does it in a morning.”

Rodrigo’s songs often allow uncomfortable emotions to remain visible. Jealousy, insecurity and fixation appear alongside affection and disappointment, giving listeners a narrator who does not always present herself as reasonable or blameless.

That approach has remained part of her identity as the sound around those songs has changed.

Olivia Rodrigo Rules Out AI in Her Music

Rodrigo was direct when discussing whether artificial intelligence could have a place in her creative work.

“I would never use AI in any of my music,” she said. “Absolutely no. Hard line on that. The closest I’d ever got is that once, me and [producer] Dan [Nigro] were like, ‘God, I wonder what ideas ChatGPT would have for an Olivia Rodrigo title,’ and they’re all fucking awful.”

Her account of making the album places the emphasis on lived experience, collaboration and revision. A relationship changed, and the songs changed with it.

For an artist whose audience responds to recognisable emotions, the connection between the person writing and the words being sung remains central.

Heartbreak Has Not Changed Her Hopes for Love

Although Rodrigo has become closely associated with breakup songs, she does not describe herself as cynical about relationships.

During the interview, she asked Millman about his forthcoming wedding, including the song he and his partner would choose for their first dance.

Her own possibilities included Modern English’s “I Melt With You” and Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers’ “There’s a Break in the Rain [Have Love Will Travel]”.

“Oh yeah, I’m such a lover girl,” she said. “I’m very optimistic about love. I can’t wait to get married — one day.”

It is a useful reminder that the emotional world of an album does not represent every part of its writer’s outlook. Rodrigo can examine disappointment in detail while still looking forward to a lasting relationship.

The Women Who Helped Shape Daisy Chain Fields

Sarah McLachlan’s Lilith Fair provided an important reference point for Daisy Chain Fields.

The women-led touring festival, established in the 1990s, challenged assumptions about how female artists could be booked and promoted together. When Rodrigo began developing her own event, McLachlan was the first person she contacted.

McLachlan supported the idea, offered advice and performed at the festival. She also gave Rodrigo a matching Lilith necklace, which both wore during the show.

Rodrigo connected the event’s purpose to the young people she sees in her audiences.

“When Lilith Fair was happening 30 years ago, women in America had more rights, had more autonomy over their bodies,” Rodrigo said. “I’ve always felt really protective of my young fans, and when I play a show and I look out into the audience and see young girls with their friends or their moms or their families, I feel such a kinship with them. And if I could be a small part in making the world a safer and better place for them to grow up and live, that’s what I want.”

Morissette, who appeared as a surprise guest after Karen O withdrew for personal reasons, also spoke about the values behind Rodrigo’s decisions.

She described Rodrigo as “a very unique artist in that her value system shows up in all the choices she makes”.

“Themes of truth-speaking, feminism and humanism, empowered sensitivity and activism permeate her environments in a way that feels mission-full and loving,” Morissette said. “There is a softening in the community around women truly being there for each other. Us women have had good reason to be wary of female safety in a patriarchal world. I can feel it in a handful of us artists that it might actually be safe to lean on each other now. Olivia is at the front of this charge.”

Why She Keeps Talking About Her Musical Influences

Rodrigo’s enthusiasm for other musicians runs throughout the interview.

She discussed the importance of Morissette’s Jagged Little Pill, her admiration for Stevie Nicks and her interest in PJ Harvey. She also praised Die Spitz, the band she included on the Daisy Chain Fields bill and selected as one of her tour’s opening acts.

“I was just floored watching their set [at Daisy Chain],” Rodrigo said. “I had chills the entire time. They’re so important.”

Her affection for The White Stripes extended to buying the vintage dress Meg White wore on the cover of Elephant. She had considered wearing it at the festival, before deciding that the heat made it impractical.

“Maybe if I do Daisy Chain in the winter, I can wear it,” she joked.

Being open about her influences has sometimes brought additional scrutiny. Earlier songs prompted comparisons with work by Taylor Swift, Paramore and Elvis Costello, while the songwriting credits added to “Deja Vu” generated years of online discussion.

Asked about that situation by The New York Times, Rodrigo said: “I just try to keep on truckin’. It was so long ago, there’s no use in harping on it.”

The experience has not stopped her celebrating the artists she loves.

“I love music. I wouldn’t be doing this if I didn’t love music,” Rodrigo said. “I think it’s as simple as that.”

“Serena Joy”, Protest Songs and Speaking Out

Rodrigo’s single “Serena Joy” takes its title from a character in The Handmaid’s Tale, using that reference to explore complacency and the consequences of allowing other people’s rights to be taken away.

Asked whether she considered it a protest song, Rodrigo replied: “I’ll take it if that’s what you call it.”

She also identified “All-American Bitch”, the opening track on Guts, as an earlier example of political expression in her writing. Its frustration with the expectations placed on women becomes a shared release during live performances, when audiences are encouraged to scream.

“I always keep my in-ear [monitors] in the whole show so I can hear what I’m doing, and I always make sure to take them out for that part so I can hear the screams,” Rodrigo said. “Every show that I’ve ever done where I did that bit, I always like to take a second to appreciate it.”

For Rodrigo, writing about politics presents a particular creative difficulty: how to communicate a position without losing the qualities that make a song work.

“My honest opinion is that they’re a little bit hard to write without feeling soapboxy,” she said. “You kind of have to be a little sarcastic, otherwise it just sort of feels like kumbaya.”

Asked whether particular images in “Serena Joy” referred to Donald Trump, she focused her answer on the song’s wider subject.

“It’s basically a song about complacency,” she said. “It’s about how an attack on one person’s human rights is an attack on all of our human rights. It’s something I’ve been thinking about a lot.”

Political Conviction and Joy at the Same Festival

Rodrigo made clear that Daisy Chain Fields had a political purpose, while also wanting it to feel hopeful.

“One hundred percent, yes,” she said when asked whether the festival was political. “But I think it’s also about joy. I think the two things can exist at the same time, they kind of have to. … I think young people have lost hope in our leaders and lost hope in each other. I really wanted to galvanize people and be evidence of what can happen when you come together and are part of something and contribute.”

Her position also informed how she spoke about the audience.

“Everyone is welcome to come to Daisy Chain,” Rodrigo said. “But if you don’t agree with the message that we’re sending, then you don’t have to buy a ticket.”

The event gave her a practical way to connect those beliefs with action: invite artists, gather an audience and direct the proceeds towards organisations she supports.

How the Festival Changed Her Relationship With Fame

One of the interview’s most revealing passages concerned the effect of Daisy Chain Fields on Rodrigo herself.

She said the festival “healed my relationship” with her feelings about being famous.

“I’ve had all this attention on me since I was 17, and I’ve only ever looked at it like an albatross around my neck,” Rodrigo said. “There’s that burden of people taking pictures of you, you can never be private about your life and who you’re dating; all that stuff can feel really negative. But Daisy Chain is a real example to me of how it actually is a real power that you can use for good. I can call Karen O and ask her if she wants to be a part of this festival. I can try and rally all these troops together to raise $20 million for these causes [including Planned Parenthood, the National Women’s Law Center and Baby2Baby] that I really care about. For as many ways as it’s negative, it can also be used for such positive, beautiful things.”

Rodrigo’s working life began well before her music career. She appeared in Disney’s Bizaardvark and later High School Musical: The Musical: The Series, before “Drivers License” brought international attention in January 2021.

The festival helped her see a different use for that attention. The same visibility that complicates her private life can also help her bring people together.

Olivia Rodrigo on Dating and Invasive Photography

That change in perspective has not removed her frustration with public scrutiny.

Rodrigo discussed how photographs of casual dates can produce assumptions about relationships, followed by arguments about what those relationships supposedly reveal about her character.

“It’s so hard and kind of sad, especially because relationships are supposed to be something private,” Rodrigo said. “I feel like every time I go on a casual date with a guy, there’s a picture of it on the internet, which feels really invasive. Sometimes you’re out with a guy who’s not your boyfriend, and suddenly the internet’s like, ‘They’re married, blah blah blah.’”

She began to frame the experience as something that came with her career, then stopped herself.

“I understand that that’s sort of part of the … you know what? No,” she said. “It actually really sucks, and it feels really invasive. It feels like you’re being stalked and then judged for pictures. Like I said, I’m single, I don’t have a boyfriend, and to be stalked outside of your home and then these pictures are being used as evidence that you’re a bad person, it’s just the craziest thing. But I know who I am, and I know what my values are, and I try to just hold on to it at the end of the day. I wish that I could be 23 years old and experience life normally.”

The distinction matters when discussing her songwriting. Choosing to share an emotion through music does not mean choosing to make every interaction part of a public story.

Returning to Education Remains an Ambition

Alongside albums and touring, Rodrigo still thinks about experiences she missed while building her career.

She took a poetry class at the University of Southern California in 2022, which helped inspire the Guts song “Lacy”. Returning to a classroom remains something she would like to do.

“I’d love to go back to school. I feel like that’s kind of a misconception that people have, that you have to go when you’re like 19 years old,” Rodrigo said. “But I would love to go and learn in more of a classroom setting. I’d love to sit in a lecture. That’d be really fun. It’s the most basic stuff, but I never had it.”

She has not decided whether that would involve pursuing a degree or taking individual courses.

Reflecting on the life she might have had without her breakthrough single, she added:

“It’s funny to think about, though, too, because had I not made ‘Drivers License’ and my career didn’t go the way that it would have, I honestly feel like I would have gone to college and done some sort of nonprofit work.”

Daisy Chain Fields has brought part of that interest into her existing career. Through the festival, Rodrigo has found a way to combine performing with support for causes she cares about, while keeping her ambitions for learning and a private life in view.