There’s a really good chance that you’ve already listened to a song called “drivers license.” Written and performed by now 18-year-old Olivia Rodrigo, it was released on January 8 and has been on Billboard’s Hot 100 ever since. And while the record-breaking song may have musical elements inspired by pop stars Taylor Swift and Lorde—Rodrigo’s favorite artists—there’s no denying that the song’s story was inspired by Rodrigo’s own heartbreak. There’s been a whole lot of speculation about what (and who) could cause Rodrigo to release such an emotional song, and although nothing is confirmed, we’re here with all the details.
WHO IS OLIVIA RODRIGO?
Olivia Rodrigo is a Filipino-American singer, songwriter, and actress, best known for her role as Nini Salazar-Roberts on High School Musical: The Musical: The Series. Born on February 20, 2003, in Temecula, California, Rodrigo has been singing and performing from a very young age. (Watch her performing at 10 years old here!) She’s been posting original songs on her Instagram for a couple of years now—and eventually, they caught the attention of Disney Plus executives and the HSMTMTS producers. She was subsequently offered the opportunity to write for the show and created “All I Want”—the show’s most popular song—as well as “Just For a Moment,” co-written by costar Joshua Bassett. With Season 2 of HSMTMTS now on the way, Rodrigo has released “drivers license” as her debut single, breaking numerous records and causing many, many tears. Much like her idol, Taylor Swift, she’s known to write songs based on her own emotions and experiences—and many believe that the inspiration behind this heartbreaking anthem is none other than Joshua Bassett himself.
WHO IS JOSHUA BASSETT?
Like Rodrigo, Joshua Bassett is a singer, song writer, and actor, born on December 22, 2000, in Oceanside, California. Bassett played several small roles in hit shows such as Grey’s Anatomy and Lethal Weapon until hitting his big break as Richard “Ricky” Bowen on HSMTMTS. Bassette has released “Common Sense” and “Anyone Else”, songs well-loved by fans. On HSMTMTS, he plays the love interest to Rodrigo’s Nini, and fans have long speculated that the romance between them exists offscreen, too. At least, it did … until Miss Sabrina Carpenter entered the picture.
WHO IS SABRINA CARPENTER?
Sabrina Annlynn Carpenter was born on May 11, 1999, in Lehigh Valley, Pennsylvania. She debuted as an actress in Law & Order: Special Victims Unit. Since starring as Maya Penelope Hart in Disney Channel’s Girl Meets World, Carpenter has held a multitude of big roles in hit movies such as The Hate U Give, Clouds, Work It, and many more. Her music career has also taken off, releasing four studio albums and many hit singles, such as “Can’t Blame a Girl for Trying” and “Why”. To top it all off, she held the starring role as Cher Horowitz in Clueless on Broadway. And now, she has yet another main role in this love triangle within Bassett and Rodrigo.
WHAT HAPPENED?
And you’re probably with that blonde girl
Who always made me doubt
She’s so much older than me
She’s everything I’m insecure about
Yeah, today I drove through the suburbs
‘Cause how could I ever love someone else?
- “drivers license” by Olivia Rodrigo
Okay, let’s backtrack a little.
Back around Halloween of 2020, both Bassett and Carpenter posted TikTok videos of them dressed up as Sharkboy and Lavagirl, and it attracted a lot of attention. No one really thought that they even knew each other, let alone might be together. Of course, there was no confirmation that they were together—but the matching costumes were a pretty decent hint. It definitely shocked fans, but not in a bad way; people seemed to really enjoy the pairing.
But then Rodrigo released “drivers license” in January, and everyone lost their marbles.
As we mentioned previously, most fans of HSMTMTS have always believed that there were some sort of sparks flying between Rodrigo and Bassett—not just because they play love interests on the show, but also because they’re best friends and have always spoken highly of each other. (See: Joshua Bassett and Olivia Rodrigo looking at each other … a lot.) After Bassett revealed Ricky’s lengthy love confession to Nini on HSMTMTS was improvised, and drew inspiration from real memories they shared together, fans went out of their minds (us included). Plus, who could resist a curly, brown-haired teenage heartthrob! However, there was never any concrete indicator that they were ever together, and especially after Bassett and Carpenter began appearing in public together, most fans dropped the notion that they ever were or ever could be.
When “drivers license” came out, though, many people began to revisit the idea of Bassett and Rodrigo’s romance—and with good reason. Rodrigo had actually written the song months before and shared a snippet of it on her Instagram in July 2020, captioned, “wrote dis the other day. vv close to my heart. gonna call it drivers license I think lol.” Fans were quick to notice that she’d changed the lyrics in her official release. While she’d initially sang about a brunette girl (the lyrics of the official single are featured above), she was now singing about a blonde girl who was much older than her. And really, the story only points to one person. (Hint: her first name starts with an S and ends with “abrina.”) This is where the love triangle gained LOTS of attention. We’re talking For You pages on TikTok filled with absolutely nothing but discussions and theories of what is really going down between the three of them.
And here’s what we think.
(Disclaimer: While we’ve done our research and gathered our evidence, please know that NONE of this information is confirmed. Above all, please respect the three of them—they’re all wonderful artists and even better humans.)
Long story short: there’s a really good chance that “drivers license” is about Bassett and Carpenter. Supposedly, Rodrigo and Bassett got together sometime during the filming of HSMTMTS and were last together around February or March of 2020, when HSMTMTS stopped filming due to the COVID-19 pandemic. We don’t really know what went down between them—but it’s a pretty reasonable guess that Bassett (for whatever reason) initiated the “breakup.” Briefly, the whole cast of HSMTMTS, with the exception of Matt Cornett, unfollowed him on social media. And, well, no one said happy birthday to him in December. :(
Bassett was first spotted with Carpenter in June. Based on this interview, Bassett first reached out to Carpenter regarding a music collaboration after his label asked him about it. From there, the two of them were frequently spotted in public together. In August, they were photographed having lunch together in LA; in January of 2021, fans found them together in Salt Lake City, Utah. Bassett also released the music video for his song, “Anyone Else,” in July. It was written in Utah, while HSMTMTS was filming, and is rumored to be about Rodrigo and her then-boyfriend, Ethan Wacker—but many fans suspect that the girl featured in the music video is actually Carpenter. If you look at the hand of the girl in the music video at 2:23, it matches the skin tone and nails of Carpenter at the time of filming.
Shortly after “drivers license” was released on January 8, Bassett released “Lie Lie Lie” (January 14) and Carpenter released “Skin” (January 22). Bassett’s song was about an ex lying about him and Carpenter’s song seemed to be a direct response to the same ex … so it’s safe to say that people went pretty nuts. Many people wondered (and are still wondering) if this whole thing was a PR stunt. All three songs were released within two weeks of each other, and the drama was already drawing a lot of attention. However, Bassett had written “Lie Lie Lie” back in 2019—with a snippet of it first revealed on Instagram on November 27—and revealed the song’s official release date back in December. Because of this, it seems unlikely that “Lie Lie Lie” was meant to be a PR stunt or a response to Rodrigo—and it also seems unlikely that it’s about Rodrigo at all, considering that he wrote it so long ago.
However, “Skin” is a bit of a different story. Tia Scola—who co-wrote “Skin” with Carpenter—revealed on Instagram that they had written the song on January 14, further leading fans to speculate that it was Carpenter’s response to “drivers license.” (She later edited the caption and took that part out.) The lyrics definitely seem like a direct clapback, and as a result, the fans got a little mad at Carpenter. Running with the idea that “Skin” really is about Rodrigo and “drivers license” is about Bassett and Carpenter, the anger is understandable, considering how petty a move it would be on Carpenter’s part. She would essentially have made an entire diss track in reaction to a song that was not even about her—and the parts that were about her were outright flattery from Rodrigo. So, for Carpenter to do this, especially when no one was blaming her in the first place, seemed unfair. However, she was quick to address the drama on her Instagram:
Carpenter was the first (and only) person to speak up about the situation, explicitly confirming that “Skin” was not meant to be a diss track or solely a response to Rodrigo. Rather, it was a means of expressing her pain and struggles, just as Rodrigo had done with “drivers license.”
And that’s pretty much it.
A tad anticlimactic, we know, but the drama seemed to die down significantly after Carpenter’s post. From her caption, it’s safe to assume that the situation between the three of them does exist—but to what extent and for what reasons, we can only guess. We’ve given it our best shot, but as we mentioned previously, nothing is confirmed (despite the very impressive investigation done by these people on TikTok).
But between all the drama and speculation, one thing’s for sure—Miss Olivia Rodrigo produced not just a hit but a HIT. It skyrocketed to the top of the charts, breaking the record for the biggest debut in Rolling Stone Top 100 history, placing her at number one right in front of Ariana Grande! But it doesn't stop there. She also broke the Spotify record for most streams of a song in a single week EVER, streamed 65,873,080 times during its first week of release. “Drivers license” also broke the record for the most requested song ever in one day on Alexa globally and the biggest first week streaming debut ever globally on Amazon Music. Truthfully, there are no words to emphasize just how impressive this feat is: at just 17 years old with her first ever single, Rodrigo made history.
You can watch the “drivers license” music video on YouTube, buy the track (and some merch! They’re on sale!) from her online store, or listen to it on all streaming platforms.
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