Olivia Rodrigo has been named TIME’s Entertainer Of The Year for 2021 ahead of the publication’s annual Person Of The Year reveal.
The 18-year-old musician immediately made an impact this year when, in January, she released her debut single “Drivers License” and immediately went viral. The track sent her to the top of the Billboard Hot 100, staying there for eight weeks and making her the youngest solo artist ever to debut at No.1 on the chart.
Rodrigo followed up that success with “Deja Vu” and the pop-punk chart-topper “good 4 u,” as well as her debut album “SOUR.” The full-length record broke the global Spotify record for the biggest opening week for an album by a female artist and topped the charts in the US, Australia, Canada, the UK, and more.
“Rodrigo has a gift for picking the best of the past—whether a well-worn shirt, the faded feedback of a guitar or the intensity of first love – and finding just the right way to situate it in the present,” TIME’s Lucy Feldman wrote of why the star had been given the honor.
“Her songs have hit with audiences of all ages, in large part because she renders adolescence so viscerally: she’s resentful, seething, crushed, itching to just grow up already.”
“SOUR” has also been named the best album of 2021 by Billboard and Rolling Stone, while Rodrigo has been nominated in seven categories at next year’s Grammy Awards, including Best New Artist, Album Of The Year, and Record Of The Year, and Song Of The Year for “Drivers License”.
Rodrigo announced her first world tour earlier this week (December 6), which will take the performer across North America, Europe, and the UK next year. She will be joined on the dates by support acts Gracie Abrams, Holly Humberstone, and Baby Queen.
