In the first few seconds of her debut album, Sour, Olivia Rodrigo declares, “I want it to be, like, messy!” That shouldn’t be too difficult for a pop star who emerged seemingly out of nowhere in January, a Disney actress whose hit “Drivers License” ignited widespread interest in a love triangle between her High School Musical: The Musical: The Series co-stars. Rodrigo belted extremely relatable, heart-wrenching lines about doing something you were supposed to do with your partner but are now doing alone — and it gave us a glimpse of her songwriting potential. It’s only May, but “Drivers License” is already the song of the year. We’ve given Rodrigo the keys. We’re just lucky to be along for the ride.
Whereas most artists build to their breakup album, carefully laying down the foundations of their future devastation, Rodrigo has already skipped ahead to her Tunnel of Love (ahem, there’s even a song titled “1 Step Forward, 3 Steps Back”). In the same vein as “Drivers License,” the ballads here tackle heartbreak with grace — even when she’s parting ways with an ex, she resists the urge to tear their new partner down. “But she’s beautiful/she’s kind,” she admits on “Happier,” one of the record’s sparkly highlights. “She probably gives you butterflies.”
Just like she did with Billy Joel on the hypnotic “Deja Vu,” Rodrigo brings old musical references back into our consciousness, like an excited teenager relaying gossip on a rotary phone. “I’m so sick of 17/Where’s my fuckin’ Teenage Dream?” she asks on “Brutal.” If you felt old hearing Katy Perry sing about Radiohead on “The One That Got Away,” you’ll feel ancient hearing this.
Rodrigo wades through Sour free of any pretenses or protection, reveling in her insecurity and weaknesses. “I wore makeup when we dated ‘cause I thought you’d like me more/If I looked like the other prom queens I know that you loved before,” she sings on “Enough For You.” She grapples with the hollowness of social media on “Jealousy, Jealousy,” inhabiting the voice of any Gen Z teen comparing themselves to others on a screen: “I wanna be you so bad/And I don’t even know you.”
She also makes sure to sprinkle in some pop-punk stunners to balance out the sadness, particularly “Good 4 U.” It’s great to hear the track without the Petra Collins pyro-cheerleader video that was a touch overblown; here it’s simply a wild blast of bitterness, like Lorde covering a Dookie B side. She meticulously sharpens her fury down to rapid send-offs — daggers dipped in glitter like “It’s like we never even happened, baby/What the fuck is up with that?”
Rodrigo was born in 2003, making her the perfect age to be inspired by late-Nineties fashion (hair clips, skinny sunglasses, butterfly stickers) and proudly assume her place as a disciple of Taylor Swift (“Traitor” is the long-lost cousin of “My Tears Ricochet”). But she’s forging a path into an entirely new realm of pop, where she’s unapologetically and enthusiastically her own guide. Just as “Deja Vu” and “Good 4 U” proved Rodrigo was going to be much more than a one-and-done phenom with a viral hit about careening through heartbreak, Sour confirms this is just the start of her story, where she expertly rides the wave of teenage turbulence and emotional chaos down any road she chooses. God, it’s brutal out here.
Over the past two decades, Animal Collective and its members have produced at least half a dozen albums widely hailed as masterpieces. But what makes AnCo feel so much like a Great Band isn’t just those records—it’s the array of one-offs, collaborations, soundtracks, and idle experiments released between the classics. Every release isn’t guaranteed to blow your mind, or even be especially listenable (take, for example, Avey Tare’s entirely-backwards collaboration with Kría Brekkan or the ear-piercing buzz of Danse Manatee, which might sound unfriendly at first). Instead, Animal Collective’s appeal lies in how they’ve staked out an oasis of aspirational strangeness where anything can happen, and the usual expectations for a critically acclaimed indie rock band need not apply.
In that context, consider A Shaw Deal, an album Animal Collective’s Geologist made with his friend Doug Shaw of Highlife. Its runtime is less than half an hour, and Geologist, aka Brian Weitz, made it as a gift for Shaw’s birthday; still, given its place within the larger AnCo constellation, perhaps it’s not especially odd that the album got a proper release with a label and PR campaign and everything. You suspect this is the kind of thing people in AnCo-land make all the time: These guys live and breathe art, and in a cultural dark age where A.I. threatens to render artistic intent an old-fashioned concept, there’s something kind of noble about how much effort went into an album that’s basically an inside joke.
Geologist made these seven tracks by taking guitar recordings Shaw posted on Instagram during the pandemic and running them through his modular system until it spat out tangles of sound. The acoustic guitar has long been associated with a certain ideal of authenticity, of not needing fancy tech to get your feelings across. Here, that idea goes delightfully out the window. In Geologist’s hands, Shaw’s acoustic guitar sounds like a million other things while still resolutely sounding like itself, its notes sliding from one to another in big, oblong blocks rather than sounding plucked or strummed. “Petticoat” begins in similar territory to the West African-inspired pop doodles on Highlife’s 2010 EP Best Bless. But by the end of the track, its sound evokes a set of rubber chickens being played like a drum kit. On “Ripper Called” Shaw’s guitar could be mistaken for a squabble between woodwinds, before we hear what sounds like a giant sleeping bag being unzipped from the inside. “Route 9 Falls” splinters a fingerpicked snippet into a cascade of notes that suggests standing beneath a waterfall in the freezing cold. It’s abrasive in a purifying way.
As a birthday gift between friends, A Shaw Deal is pretty charming, but what’s in it for the casual fan? It contains no nods to pop, no moments that aim for the Beach Boys-like transcendence that permeates even Animal Collective’s looser and more improvisational releases. Your tolerance for freeform and frequently harsh-sounding guitar music determines whether A Shaw Deal will make it into your regular rotation or slot into the lesser-played ranks of the band’s catalog. But its funky, egoless spirit is infectious: less of a towering individual statement than another vivid shade in the wild splotch of color the members of Animal Collective have left across indie music.