Today, multi-Platinum-selling three-time GRAMMY®-winner Olivia Rodrigo shares her exhilarating new single “bad idea right?” and its accompanying video. The follow-up to “vampire” — a June release that debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 and marked her biggest debut of all time on multiple platforms — “bad idea right?” is the second single from Rodrigo’s forthcoming sophomore album GUTS, due out via Geffen Records on September 8. Both “vampire” and “bad idea right?” are available now as instant grat tracks for those who pre-order the album.
In a dramatic shift from the piano-driven intensity of “vampire” — named a “Best New Track” by Pitchfork and currently top 5 at Top 40 radio— “bad idea right?” arrives as a frenetic and wildly fun look at getting back with an ex against all better judgment. As the song unfolds, the 20-year-old artist narrates her feverish inner monologue with both self-aware humor and confessional candor, once again showcasing the unfiltered yet sharply crafted songwriting first revealed on her 4x Platinum 2021 full-length debut SOUR. Produced by and co-written with her frequent collaborator Daniel Nigro, “bad idea right?” sets that storytelling to a dizzying backdrop of chaotic guitar riffs, pounding drumbeats, and giddy gang vocals — fully echoing the playful spirit of the songwriting process.
“‘bad idea right?’ started with us making a joke song about me hooking up with an ex-boyfriend, but then we realized we were actually onto something,” Rodrigo says. “We were throwing the weirdest things at the wall — in one of the choruses there’s a part that sounds like an instrument in the background, but it’s me gradually screaming louder and louder.”
A perfect reflection of the song’s madcap energy, the video for “bad idea right?” is Rodrigo’s latest collaboration with Petra Collins — the famed artist/director/photographer who earned a GRAMMY® nomination for her work on the video for Rodrigo’s 4x Platinum, Billboard Hot 100-topping “good 4 u” and also directed the videos for her 2x Platinum “brutal” and for the 5x MTV VMA nominated “vampire” (with the latter marking Rodrigo’s biggest YouTube debut to date, amassing over 12.9M views in its first 24 hours and hitting #1 on YouTube’s US Top Music Videos chart). With its aesthetic partly inspired by early-’90s B-movie horror-comedy, the video for “bad idea right?” follows Rodrigo on a journey to an ex’s house, equal parts surreal and harrowing and fantastically absurd. The video for “bad idea right?” made its broadcast premiere on MTV Live, MTVU, MTV Biggest Pop and on the Paramount Times Square billboards.
Exclusively available at Rodrigo’s online store, the vinyl version of GUTS will be offered in four colors: red, white, blue, and purple. In addition, an exclusive colored vinyl and CD (both with alternative cover and poster) are available for pre-order at Target. On Tuesday, pre-orders for an exclusive picture disc vinyl version of the album were also made available via the Spotify Fans First program. See below for the full tracklist to GUTS.
Partly written at the legendary Electric Lady Studios in New York City, GUTS mostly came to life in Nigro’s garage studio in Los Angeles. Although each song intensifies the emotional honesty that has always imbued her songwriting, the album finds Rodrigo expanding her expressive palette and uncovering entirely new dimensions of her artistry. An auspicious introduction to the next chapter of her already-extraordinary career, “vampire” quickly set the Spotify record for the biggest debut for a solo song in 2023. The song also made Rodrigo the first artist ever to debut the lead singles from two career-opening albums atop the Billboard Hot 100, thanks in part to her 5x Platinum debut single “drivers license.” Rodrigo is also the youngest artist in Hot 100 history to debut three hits at No. 1, while SOUR is the fastest album in history to have all its songs certified RIAA Platinum.
Tracklist for GUTS
- all-american bitch
- bad idea right?
- vampire
- lacy
- ballad of a homeschooled girl
- making the bed
- logical
- get him back!
- love is embarrassing
- the grudge
- pretty isn’t pretty
- teenage dream