Olivia Rodrigo says “experimental” new album is full of “sad love songs”

Olivia Rodrigo has teased that her “experimental” new album will be full of “sad love songs”.

Speculation has been mounting this week that the singer is gearing up to release new music, with cryptic pink album teasers having been discovered by fans in Los Angeles and London.

Rodrigo released her last album ‘Guts’ in 2023, itself the follow-up to her critically acclaimed breakthrough record ‘Sour’ two years earlier. Since then, she has played countless huge headline shows, including her Pyramid Stage headline set at Glastonbury 2025, where she brought out The Cure’s Robert Smith as a special guest.

The singer has now been interviewed in the new edition of British Vogue, with the feature describing what they have heard of the new record as Rodrigo at her “most experimental”, with one track being labelled as “smooth, trippy soft rock”.

Rodrigo herself told the publication that the album consists of “sad love songs”, adding: “I realised all my favourite romantic love songs were beautiful because they had a tinge of fear or yearning in them.”

“I’ve found a lot of inspiration from being in London,” she added. “I’ve spent so much time here over the course of making this album. It has a lot of songs that are London vibes, about experiences that I’ve had here.

“It was a creative challenge to write from a joyful place. When you’re experiencing that you’re connected to someone, or feeling really good, you’re not in your head thinking about bittersweet poems!”

Part of the reason for Rodrigo’s extended stays in London can be attributed to her relationship with the British actor Louis Partridge, known for House Of Guinness and Enola Holmes.

Elsewhere in the British Vogue piece, Robert Smith opened up about his relationship with Rodrigo, revealing that he became a fan after hearing her breakout single ‘Drivers License’, and went on to buy both ‘Sour’ and ‘Guts’.

“Although most of the songs on those two albums are not really ‘aimed at my demographic’, they are all so good that it is hard not to fall in love with them,” Smith wrote in the piece.

He went on to say that the two artists had remained friends since their live team-up at Glastonbury, and hinted at a potential upcoming collaboration.

“She calls me up quite a bit to talk about clothes and fashion – and we have enjoyed a couple of memorable nights in the studio together,” Smith continued. “I can’t wait to hear what she does next!”

Last year, Rodrigo released her live duets with Smith as part of her ‘Live From Glastonbury 2025’ album.

In addition to her love of The Cure, Rodrigo said in December that she has recently found inspiration from the likes of New Order and Joy Division, as well as The White Stripes and Bikini Kill.

Before then, she said in 2023 that she had been to watch The Cure and Depeche Mode live with her dad, and added that her parents were mainly into “grunge, rock and alternative” music when she was growing up, which rubbed off on her.

During a conversation with NME in 2021, Rodrigo said both her mother and father were “music heads” and had encouraged their daughter’s artistic endeavours from an early age.

“I love pop-punk music; I love grunge music; I love country music and folk music,” she explained at the time. “I think, honestly, you can see little influences of all of those genres in my [debut] album [‘Sour’].”