Olivia Rodrigo Is Sad Again

Olivia Rodrigo’s music isn’t built for long-term happiness. “Drop Dead,” the lead single off her upcoming album, You Seem Pretty Sad for a Girl So in Love, displays an uncharacteristically chipper Rodrigo as she meets a guy she’s been crushing on and then giddily kisses him in the bar. Now comes the album’s second single, “The Cure,” which brings her back down to Earth. The track follows her as she realizes that no matter how much the guy she’s with loves her, and no matter how much she loves him, their relationship won’t fix her soul. “But my head is full of poison, and my heart is full of doubt,” she sings on the chorus. “I got toxins in my bloodstream, you tried hard to suck ’em out / And it feels like medication, and it’s good for me, I’m sure / But it don’t matter how your love feels anymore / It’ll never be the cure.” It’s the first time we’ve seen a full realization of the album title, juxtaposing a good relationship with a central sadness within her.

Discussing “The Cure” on The Elvis Duran Show yesterday, Rodrigo said that she was “really, really proud of this song.” “I think it’s a new perspective that I haven’t had the maturity to express before in earlier albums,” she said. She also confirmed that the track has nothing to do with the band the Cure, despite the fact that she loves their music. “Although I love [the Cure] so much, it just is a happy coincidence,” she clarified.

In the music video, Rodrigo plays a nurse attempting to find a cure for something that’s destroying hearts, until she pricks herself and falls ill herself. It’s a highly stylized stop-motion video that softens the concept (literally) with blood made out of yarn and tender knit “hearts.” At the end, a giant Rodrigo picks up the hospital as the camera pans out to reveal that the hospital is a diorama and Rodrigo is in the process of moving. She then stomps it to pieces and leaves the room. Find out where she goes when the full album comes out June 12.