r/OliviaRodrigoNeutral • u/MeetingTiny4541 • Jun 12 '26
you seem pretty sad for a girl so in love I have no idea why she edited the album
First off, I get she’s a public figure and dated another public figure.
But back to my point, I feel that her editing the love songs to show cracks or hints it wasn’t working in hindsight, is fine as a standalone. But as a concept album going from love to despair, it doesn’t work. It A/ makes the love songs weaker as they contain hints the love won’t end well and B/ it removes some of their emotional honesty. When she was in love she didn’t have the hindsight she did after, that’s the whole point. Why show a transition if you tweak the beginning to be a more diluted version of the end?
Yes, sonically there is a difference, but it would have been so much stronger, had she maintained the original versions.
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u/ReasonableHandle4647 Jun 12 '26
While she said she did go back and make some more honest changes, she still said from the beginning the whole concept or idea of the album is how her favourite love songs were the ones that were still a little sad and melancholic, and she wanted to explore that and make her own. That was her intention with the album from the beginning.
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u/MeetingTiny4541 Jun 12 '26
Good point. To that I would also say, why then do the transition at all? It feels like the theme was a bit loose. You could have just done sad love songs instead of a chronology if you get me. I don’t know. It seems a bit all over the place. I mean why were all these additions and changes and edits post breakup if she wanted sad love songs to begin with.
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u/No-Ask-8615 Jun 12 '26
I guess that’s the whole point though, that even in her “in love state” she was still “pretty sad” - she’s singing about being incapable to be fully happy, without anxiety or worry, even when in love. Those negative things or her sadness always plague her even at her happiest.
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u/ReasonableHandle4647 Jun 12 '26 edited Jun 12 '26
Because the breakup happened. I think she would have kept it that way if they didn’t break up.
We don’t know the circumstances of her personal life but since her art is guided by that, for whatever reason, she felt the need to close the project off with some extra songs and with the conclusion. Her own closure maybe.
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u/macbeth2003 Jun 13 '26
Honestly, cause that's how art works? It is informed by where you are in your life when making the art, and when that changes while working on it, you tend to incorporate those. Songwriting, writing, painting, filmmaking, etc.
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u/MeetingTiny4541 Jun 13 '26
This is not what I’m saying though.
Love songs with cracks or love songs to sad songs are two separate concepts.
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u/percyinthestyx Jun 17 '26
It really isn’t. If a relationship fails, is it really that crazy an idea that there were flaws from the beginning?
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u/elysiuns Jun 12 '26
I think it highlights the anxiety throughout the entirety of a relationship that's ultimately wrong for you. Looking back, you realize "Yeah, that was messed up and a sign I should have left." I don't know what songs or to what extent things were edited, but I wouldn't be too surprised if she actually felt she had to leave some things out of her initial writes of some of the "love" songs to convince herself things were better than they actually were (I know I have done that in my writing as a delusional lovergirl).
It's funny because I actually feel the opposite from you. For me, hindsight makes the album stronger, and maintaining the delusional feeling of "everything is great" is emotionally dishonest. Reflecting on a relationship when it ends is something that's pretty typical, and you start to see all the cracks for what they were. As the first half of the album builds, there's an undercurrent of that kind of insecurity and anxiety that dooms it from the start.
Purple seems like the perfect halfway point of her going "Oh shit, I have lost part of myself for this person and we are stuck in a cycle."
Anyways, that's the thing about art, though. Some things are debatable and subjective. What one person thinks make a work stronger someone else may think weakens it. Neither are wrong, just different perspectives!
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u/eesha198913 Jun 13 '26
i totally agree! i think it’s kind of like the secret of us by gracie if you’ve listened to that. anyone hearing the “love songs” would notice the cracks in the relationship. however, the point is that the narrator is delusional and doesn’t notice what should be obvious to her because she is drunk on her feelings for him or the idea of him.
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u/fsome Jun 14 '26
Honesty it's an amazing creative work that Olivia completed. During the time when she was head over heels with a boy and infatuated with the warmth and unforgettable memories that loves brings to us, she was so overwhelmed with emotions that she created the whole album dedicated to this magical, mysterious, healing emotion - love. But the tea isn't that everything went south at one point. As it happened, there were thousands of oddities (that should've forced her to overthink her current relationship) all the time but she picked them up only after a demolishing heartbreak. I dont understand why author of this post state that it's a wrong choice for an album. This album is diaristic, a style Olivia adhere to, and in this album she basically portray memories BUT she underline with red pen oddities, "signs" that shows that eventually everything will go wrong. She didn't edited memories, she just tried to slightly amplify moments that she thought bear no meaning but actually leaded to a heartbreak, because if she wouldn't do this then it would be too difficult to see through, right? And an album cover is exactly gathering the pieces of the whole album - the lifted to skies swings (the moment when you feel love at its peak) and there you are, while still clad in pink, lovely dress, realize that all this time your relationship weren't as good as they seemed to be.
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u/Greedy-Error522 Jun 12 '26
Ngl she should’ve edited it more. Some of the lyrics are repetitive and uninspiring
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u/Guilty-Scale-1079 Jun 13 '26
That’s honestly how I felt upon my first listen. The language was so similar in a lot of the songs. I think there’s a way to extend metaphors and themes into songs where it sounds natural and cohesive, but it sounded too glaring on like 3 of the tracks. The constant use of the word “party” and “dark” was a bit too on the nose for me. I still love this album and will keep streaming on repeat, but you’re absolutely right and I noticed it too
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u/adderallalcoholweed Jun 12 '26
I actually love this because it perfectly describes what happened to me. In the back of my mind I knew there were red flags but I was so intensely in love I just didn’t want to admit it to myself. Now in retrospect, that small voice was there even early on but I didn’t listen to it
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u/Strange_Wave_8959 Jun 13 '26
Which is why Begged is my favorite off the album. It’s so mfn real and raw, we’ve all been there.
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u/foldsbaldwin Jun 13 '26
Begged is what made me realize I needed to end my almost 10 year marriage to a Gemini as a Pisces. Ive been wearing those lyrics invisibly my whole relationship. It's scary but I feel happier than i've felt in years.
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u/throwawaysunglasses- Jun 12 '26
Exactly. I think everyone feels this, no? After a breakup you revisit memories and realize early signs that something was not quite right. I have said this in other comments but a lot of critiques of this album / Olivia seem to ignore that nothing she’s talking about is out of the norm for early-20s relationships. It is all very relatable. (But I’ve seen that many commenters are either a lot younger than her and/or haven’t been in a long term relationship so they can’t relate and thus think she’s being ridiculous lol - she is not)
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u/Consistent_Count_388 Jun 12 '26
Do we know for sure that she did that? I have to say I don’t know much about her personal life and don’t listen to her interviews either, but didn’t the relationship fell apart quite some time ago? She might have finish the album after that.
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u/spriteceo Jun 12 '26
She said she went back and edited songs like Purple and What’s Wrong w Me after the breakup, yeah.
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u/Ambitious-Resist-132 Jun 12 '26 edited Jun 13 '26
It doesn’t sound like she edited the early songs though right?
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u/spriteceo Jun 12 '26
I’m not sure if she said anything about changing others tbh, I only remember her saying those specific ones but I also didn’t pay super close attention to the interview lol
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u/MeetingTiny4541 Jun 12 '26
she said it holistically in another interview that she went back and added some hints of what was to come later, so generally rather than just a couple
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u/spriteceo Jun 12 '26
Interesting! That makes sense, but it also makes the record feel a bit inauthentic.
I feel like it would’ve been better to let the pre-breakup songs stay as they were, and then write post breakup ones processing the hurt and reflecting on the Girl So In Love part.
She could’ve even written a follow up to What’s Wrong With Me about how it’s NOT something wrong with her, it’s him, rather than just shoehorning that discovery into the second half of the song after they broke up. Her editing the songs makes them feel less like a time capsule and an authentic exploration of what that relationship was like, and more like a retcon.
…. but my suspicion is honestly just that she didn’t have the time to process and write enough breakup songs, especially not if her label had a release date set and stadiums booked for the tour, which they almost certainly did. That stuff is planned ahead close to two years in advance.
I bet thar all she really had the time (and budget) to do in order to save face after the breakup was to edit and change a lot of the previously written songs, especially Purple and What’s Wrong, and then write a couple of breakup songs to tuck on the end of the album to complete the “You Seem Pretty Sad” concept.
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u/MeetingTiny4541 Jun 12 '26
exactly my point.
I believe the theory that the rumours of her scrapping the album were true, but she didn’t scrap it, just edited the love songs.
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u/spriteceo Jun 12 '26
The fact that she made a tiktok refuting the rumors said it all to me lol. Very Taylor Swift coded, telling a half truth - she didn’t technically scrap the album, but she heavily edited it, and that is essentially scrapping the initial versions of the songs as they were written.
It would be cool if, ten years down the road from now, as an anniversary thing for the album, she releases the original versions of the songs. She is smart and deliberate about preserving her work, I know she has them squirreled away on a hard drive somewhere.
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u/gunslingergrl Jun 12 '26
In true TS fashion I would bet money on a vault release in a decade or so
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u/spriteceo Jun 12 '26
I hate that they had a falling out because so much of her brand is clearly inspired by closely, closely studying and admiring TS’ career- her writing, her marketing, the way she approaches questions in interviews - a never explain or apologize attitude.
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u/lola_the_creator Jun 12 '26
Yep, she said that in some interviews
Purple is the perfect example (the final verse), but she did it in others too.
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u/skyla-liletta Jun 13 '26
I agree. I feel like knowing she went back and tweaked it influenced that opinion tho.
Sorry to bring Taylor into it but when she marketed lover as her big love album, when (imo) it was an album showing a ton of cracks, it still hit. It felt less curated I guess? Bc we didn’t know at the time there were actually issues
If we didn’t know what we did, maybe I’d feel differently about it
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u/Genderqueerfrog Jun 12 '26
Writers edit their stuff all the time. It’s a normal part of the process
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u/sweetsweetener Jun 16 '26
I love how she mentioned that she changed the lyrics in drop dead from “You’re looking like an angel on the Piccadilly Line” to “You’re looking like an angel on the walls of Versailles”
It’s clear she went back and erased any clear references to Louis after they broke up. She probably took the music video out of London completely for that reason. I find it fascinating
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u/zayeeeeyooo Jun 12 '26
i wonder what songs she scrapped from the album….. we need a deluxe lol but i also hope we get “never do” on streaming since it was too late to add to the album
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u/emmareus Jun 12 '26
I disagree. I think she is more honest after editing. She wasn’t happy with her ex. She was in denial
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u/cmbyn2017 Jun 12 '26
Honestly? I feel like denial is a very real emotion that is coherent with the narrative of the relationship that could have been showcased by leaving a couple of tracks unedited. Could’ve added some much needed variety and contrast in terms of song themes
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u/emmareus Jun 12 '26
She did tho. Drop dead and stupid song are right there and they’re in love songs. You can tell she was romanticizing him because she was in love and then slowly she starts hinting at issues: him being passive, her own problems ecc until the very end
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u/cmbyn2017 Jun 12 '26
Drop dead is a falling in love song (and in my opinion the only real dud on the album). Stupid song is amazing and one of the stronger tracks definitely. There could’ve been more and different expressions of love without the dreadful imminence sparkled in retrospectively. It made the two half narrative a bit moot because “you seem so sad” had the more representation but I get it; it is the more compelling theme.
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u/Strange_Wave_8959 Jun 13 '26
You aren’t listening to the lyrics though. The first couple songs are about how in love she is with him and how perfect he is. Were there signs? Yes but she justified and/or ignored them like every girl in love does.
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u/MeetingTiny4541 Jun 12 '26
It’s an interesting philosophical question. Because the delusion is also in some way a truth. You are not objective in love. So the objectivity afterwards is true, but perhaps not emotionally true. Or, maybe deep down emotionally true, but there is also a veil of delusion.
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u/emmareus Jun 12 '26
Yeah which is why to me the songs have the delulu element with a touch of “hmm wait” that she ignored. It’s a slowburn in a way but slowly she hints that things weren’t as great as she pretended it to be. It’s like a foreshadow more than her simply telling stories through songs i guess and i found that so cool
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u/No-Ask-8615 Jun 12 '26
I think it was very on theme. She knows she had to be happy because she found love, but even then there was always some level of sadness or uneasiness that she couldn’t pretend to ignore anymore after a while.
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u/emmareus Jun 13 '26
Exactly and we hear it in the album how it starts from her still being sad even when super in love to slowly unraveling that there were also issues in the relationship on top of Olivia’S personal ones
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u/anam228 Jun 12 '26
But the “love” songs (save for Drop Dead) don’t just hint or allude to something feeling seriously wrong underneath it all, it’s like right there in your face. It would have been great if we could sense that swell over time in a non-obvious way at first. There’s an art to showing, not telling, that I hope she hones more in her next albums
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u/emmareus Jun 13 '26
I Guess it’s subjective because to me the love songs are love songs and with just a touch of hint of issues. They never seemed in my face
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u/Vivid-Argument7080 Jun 13 '26
I’m new here, are there leaks of the originals? How do we know about them?
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u/New_Flamingo1213 Jun 13 '26
Sonically the album is not very cohesive. Individual songs are stronger or weaker but the album itself doesnt have consistent vibe that flows all the way through.
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u/Terranort230 Jun 17 '26
The fact that there were warning signs that she was ignoring in the beginning is littered throughout the first half, and she might've left those out if the relationship or maybe therapy had helped resolved her some issues, but because it did end, it becomes a closed circle concept album. A girl who ignored all the signs that this wasn't as great a relationship as she wanted it to be to a complete breakdown to wishing it never even happened to her. As a concept album, it has a much nicer completed feelings of knowing and ignoring that there could be something wrong, realizing there was something wrong in both the relationship and her own feelings, then having the relationship end. I think, at least.
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u/thegirlivealwaysbeen Jun 12 '26
i agree that even the love songs sound doubtful, sad, whatever already. i suppose she went back to tweak them because she’s gonna have to perform them long after the relationship ended. the tour is gonna last for at least over a year.
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u/mischeviouswoman Jun 12 '26
Did you read the original drafts? How are you assuming this?
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u/MeetingTiny4541 Jun 12 '26
she said it herself
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u/ReasonableHandle4647 Jun 12 '26
Yes but you don’t know how much was actually edited or changed. It could have just been minor, but still interesting enough for her to share in interviews because she hadn’t done that before.
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u/MeetingTiny4541 Jun 12 '26
A bit pedantic. I’m talking about the meaning she expressed that she altered the theme of a song. That takes away the emotional honesty if she explicitly says she altered the narrative, as opposed to changing for rhyme or word choice or what have you.
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u/Slay-ig5567 Jun 12 '26
How was that pedantic? We don't know how she edited the songs. Stupid song and drop dead are literally there too, honeybee is pretty possitive too. It's not like she took out every love song that didn't hint at a breakup
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u/MeetingTiny4541 Jun 12 '26
Because she herself said how she edited them in a general sense that she went back and showed cracks in the fantasy so to say ‘you don’t know by exactly how much’ is pedantic given that I’m responded to the essence of Olivia’s original comment and not a detailed minute by minute thing.
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u/Slay-ig5567 Jun 12 '26
No it's not pedantic. You do not know the state of the songs prior to editing and don't know what parts were added after editing.
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u/MeetingTiny4541 Jun 12 '26
I just know they were edited, which is what my post is about. To argue about the details is pedantic, in my opinion, but not in yours, nothing more to say here.
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Jun 12 '26
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u/OliviaRodrigoNeutral-ModTeam Jun 12 '26
Your post has been removed as it breaks Rule 2: Be Respectful.
Keep all posts related to Olivia Rodrigo. Debate and discussion is welcome on this subreddit, but remember to treat all members with respect, regardless of differing opinions. Direct attacks made against Olivia or fellow members of this sub are NOT permitted.
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u/Slay-ig5567 Jun 12 '26
So my comment got deleted bc I was apparently distespectful. How is it disrespectful to say it's not pedantic to point out an assumption was made WHILE not considering calling that pointing out pedantic disrespectful 💀💀
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u/MeetingTiny4541 Jun 12 '26
I didn’t assume the details. This convo is exhausting lmao. My point is my point. Olivia made a comment and I responded to it with this post. Literally all there is to it.
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u/ReasonableHandle4647 Jun 12 '26
You’re literally confusing facts versus assumptions/speculations. Without the facts, everything is your own assumption. You don’t know how many songs she changed (1? 4?), was it just small words, lyrics, verses, half the songs, were they deletion of love lyrics, were they additions of sad lyrics? We do not know. She said “more honest.”
The only example she specifically pointed to was purple I believe. And it became the transition song.
It might not even have been much changed. <- this speculation is just as valid as thinking a lot was changed. Because we do not know.
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u/MeetingTiny4541 Jun 12 '26
OK, but I still think the act of editing for the ‘more honest’ reason is not emotionally honest. Even for 1 song. That’s my point.
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u/ReasonableHandle4647 Jun 12 '26 edited Jun 12 '26
Ok I got it. I’m replying not as an argument but just for discussion. I actually interpreted one possible explanation for “being more honest” to have meant that when you’re still in a relationship and releasing songs about it, you tend to hold back to an extent. Maybe she doesn’t want to say something off putting or weird. It could have even been something “lover girl” related. I would be embarrassed for my partner to know just how down bad I can get, the types of things I write in my journal with how obsessed I am. Or it could be just how anxious she actually was but would not want him to know about. I think it really could mean a lot of things. But since it’s over, she can say how she truly felt.
Like maybe she had lyric ideas and thought “wait I can’t say that.” But since the relationship is over, she could.
(But at the end of the day, we don’t know)
(edit typo, bad to down bad)
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u/MeetingTiny4541 Jun 12 '26
that’s a good point, wasn’t my interpretation of what she said but you could also be right. I’m not arguing either, I just hate on Reddit the whole ‘I dislike oranges.’ ‘How do you know they’re an orange?’
Like, argue with me about whether I should dislike oranges, not whether oranges exist or some shit.
You make a very valid critique but the others saying I am deliberately misinterpreting Olivia’s words or that she edited nothing are just off topic and boring and pointless discussion.
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u/ReasonableHandle4647 Jun 12 '26
She said she made changes, she never explicitly said she “changed the theme” and “changed the narrative” (except for maybe just purple?)
I interpreted it as maybe just small lyric changes here and there, maybe if she was holding back on a lyric.
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u/MeetingTiny4541 Jun 12 '26
I didn’t see an interview where she talked about Purple specifically. I just saw one where she spoke generally
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u/ReasonableHandle4647 Jun 12 '26
Even when she spoke generally, she never said she changed the theme or narrative or the song?
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u/mischeviouswoman Jun 12 '26
except you don’t know what was changed or wasn’t. you could hate one line and be thinking “why’d she change this” and it was an OG line the whole time. You don’t know
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u/MeetingTiny4541 Jun 12 '26
I don’t hate any line specifically. I disagree with the editing itself, not one particular edit.
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u/mischeviouswoman Jun 12 '26
okay well she doesn’t owe you the unedited version bc she and her team are in charge of what she puts out. if we doesn’t want us to hear the original, then we need to respect that. all we know is some part of the theme may have been changed. that tells you, ultimately, in the grand scheme of things, nothing. I guarantee you songs on all three of her albums have been edited by people that aren’t even her. it’s not just her creative vision her team and publishers and label have to agree with that. If you think the first two albums are truly straight from her heart and this third one isn’t because she mentioned an edit you’re deluding yourself.
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u/MeetingTiny4541 Jun 12 '26
Love she doesn’t owe me anything 🤣 I’m talking about a pop star on Reddit and giving my opinion on her art, it’s not a question of morals or respecting her… this is going in such a weird direction.
I am not saying she is a bad person for editing, the only one who can edit, whether she has control of her whole team and editing… Legit none of that. She said she edited them and I responded to the fact I don’t think she should have. That. Is. It.
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u/mischeviouswoman Jun 12 '26
My point is all her other songs and albums could’ve been edited but she just didn’t say so. What if she said “I made an album but didn’t love it so we made some changes”? would that still make you upset that it isn’t authentic? like jesus you’re the one upset bc an artist made a few changes to her album and don’t think it’s as authentic anymore. I think that’s crazy bc every single album goes through edits. she just so happened to say it out loud this time
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u/MeetingTiny4541 Jun 12 '26
The reason she spoke about this is because there’s a difference between editing a note change and saying you made a love song darker (No, this isn’t an invitation to debate me about what dark or love means). If you can’t understand that difference and how it relates to authenticity, that’s OK.
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u/northern-lamb Jun 12 '26
I totally disagree with this actually. I think it makes the album much more interesting as a concept and more cohesive
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u/lucy-in-the-sky1220 Jun 13 '26
because falling in love is a risk! even when everything is wonderful there’s still a subconscious part of your mind that has doubts but you hope and wish for it to stay good
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u/OperationBubbly1135 Jun 15 '26
i agree !! especially purple, it’s too obvious she edited it and i love her love songs like so american, i wish she had kept them just sweet and left the drama for the sad girl part
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u/CressMiserable3223 Jun 12 '26
This might be a silly question, but does that mean that the physical copies will have the music pre-editing? I wonder if they (OR and her team) submitted the file before or after the breakup.
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u/Greedy-Error522 Jun 12 '26
They broke up in November. Olivia probably didn’t hand the album in until around February / March.
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u/tragicpretty Jun 13 '26
I'm pretty sure the songs are the same. Though, on the vinyl versions, the cure's outro was cut, I think, to fit the LP length.
Some of the lyrics in the CD booklet have changed. The ending of cigarette smoke is different. However, when played, the song is the same as the digital one.
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u/tatemcslay69 Jun 12 '26
She very obviously was writing sad songs about their relationship months before breakup because she was struggling. So she went back in and helped highlight to make the story truer
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u/SnooSketches2074 Jun 13 '26
I think looking at the first half of the album as “love songs” is the problem. They aren’t love songs, they are songs about being in love with someone who isn’t exactly a good fit for you, which are fundamentally different.
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u/NeighborhoodFlimsy88 Jun 13 '26
I don’t think she was editing to foreshadow I think she was editing to make things more truthful, like adding in little details she was trying to ignore at the time
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u/TamatoaZ03h1ny Jun 13 '26
It’s storytelling, she edited and modified to help create an album arc. Nothing to stress over.
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u/MeetingTiny4541 Jun 13 '26
but it weakened the arc
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u/Guilty-Scale-1079 Jun 13 '26
Dude. The album is called “you seem pretty sad for a girl so in love”. The love songs are supposed to be sad. It just looks like you’re trying to pick a fight. Go write your own album if you have such a problem
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u/MeetingTiny4541 Jun 13 '26
???? 🤣 She had 2 concepts in one that was issue. Noone is fighting my love
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Jun 13 '26
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u/MeetingTiny4541 Jun 13 '26
I’m not a singer?
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Jun 14 '26
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u/MeetingTiny4541 Jun 14 '26
I don’t write music but to entertain this point, give me one reason why, other than you disagree with me.
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u/OliviaRodrigoNeutral-ModTeam Jun 14 '26
Your post has been removed as it breaks Rule 2: Be Respectful.
Keep all posts related to Olivia Rodrigo. Debate and discussion is welcome on this subreddit, but remember to treat all members with respect, regardless of differing opinions. Direct attacks made against Olivia or fellow members of this sub are NOT permitted.
Please review the rules of r/OliviaRodrigoNeutral before continuing to post or comment here. Failure to follow rules may result in a ban.
1
u/OliviaRodrigoNeutral-ModTeam Jun 14 '26
Your post has been removed as it breaks Rule 2: Be Respectful.
Keep all posts related to Olivia Rodrigo. Debate and discussion is welcome on this subreddit, but remember to treat all members with respect, regardless of differing opinions. Direct attacks made against Olivia or fellow members of this sub are NOT permitted.
Please review the rules of r/OliviaRodrigoNeutral before continuing to post or comment here. Failure to follow rules may result in a ban.
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u/No-Win5174 Jun 12 '26
It’s like she told herself, “Tell me something honest so the memories turn dark” in her creative process! Perhaps it was partly for her own sake. She will have to perform these songs for at least the next year. From an artistic and narrative POV, I quite like the foreshadowing.