Released on January 8, Olivia Rodrigo’s ‘Drivers License’ has already broken the Spotify record of the most streamed song in one day – over 17 million streams, outdoing Ariana Grande’s previous maximum by 13%.
Generally, you start a review by trying to sum up its interest, its “usp” in one witty, descriptive sentence, but quite frankly this is the only thing of interest about this single. Its accumulated fame is the only thing that makes it remarkable – in the UK alone Rodrigo racked up 2.4 million listeners on January 12.
For a 17-year-old, of course the song is impressive. Despite starting out as a 13-year-old Disney star of Bizaardvark, and more recently High School Musical: the Series, she has already described herself to Genius as a singer first, and an actress second.
But if you let the song stand alone, can it really deserve this credit? With an analytical melody and pandering clichés, it speaks to a generation weaned from Disney Channel onto TikTok. This is crucial to Rodrigo’s success – with a 3.9 million following on this platform, added to a further 4.7 million on Instagram, her posts teasing the song gained hundreds of thousands of likes, also being endorsed by Taylor Swift to her own 145 million-strong fanbase.
Swift went so far as to comment underneath Rodrigo’s post: “I say that’s my baby and I’m really proud” – a quote from her own mother, who’s incredibly close relationship has led to tributes in “Best Friend”, and “Soon You’ll Get Better”. A post highlighting this gained more than 5.7 million views on Instagram, and 3.1 million likes on TikTok.
This is added to rumours that it is stringently based off a supposed relationship with Rodrigo’s CoStar Joshua Barrett – it is essentially a gossip column is a Hollywood tabloid.
Her voice has a songbird fragility that mimics, but fails to attain any of the depth of similar artists, such as Regina Spektor. Overlaid car bleepers, while relevant to the song’s subject, are frankly as distracting as the vague clapping that fades in and out of the verses.
Overall, the song flexes and wanes, disjointed in a flaccid conviction, a seeming attempt to live up to every folklore song – it borrows the acoustic piano from the start of ‘the last great american dynasty’, the whispering staccato of ‘epiphany’, and the expansion to power in ‘illicit affairs’.
So can ‘Drivers License’ live up to the other surprise acts exploding through the charts over the last couple of years? Really it’s a clear “no”.
Think back to 2018, when the opening chords of ‘Someone You Loved’ first crisped your throat like January frost, holding you with a shaking vulnerability regardless of your musical taste, background or opinions on Capaldi himself.
With brutally honest lyrics, born from a musical career starting when he sang in pubs aged nine, his music is a cumulation of experience and passion. ‘Drivers License’ speaks of commercial aptitude, a rigorous abidance to the style of romance found within Disney series, and just enough swearing to convince the 13-year-old listener that it’s “edgy”, without offending their parents.
In his Desert Island Disks, Tim Minchin said that the critic should not judge a performance on their subjective impression, but on whether the artist reached their goals. ‘Drivers License’ clearly did achieve these goals – it broke records unattainable for any A-lister.
But does this make it a good song? The piece itself is cynical and animatronic, and, while pretty to the first listen, will never become the soundtrack to your heartbreaks.