Beyond the U.S., the rest of the world discovers Olivia Rodrigo

BILLBOARD

Olivia Rodrigo composing songs in her bedroom.

Outperforming better known artists such as Arianna Grande, The Weekend and Dua Lipa, Filipino American song writer and singer Olivia Rodrigo is still taken aback at her success, enjoying her third week at the top of Billboard's Hot 100.

“I have all of these amazing opportunities now,” Rodrigo told Billboard, “and so many people that I look up to have reached out and expressed their love for the song, which is absolutely surreal. But I truly am just the same 17-year-old girl, doing statistics homework in my bedroom.”

In addition, the popularity of "Driver's License" has fans looking up her earlier songs so that "All I Want," a hit recording she released last year, is having a resurgence finishing the week at 148 in the top 200 in the U.S. and 119 in the Global 200.

The Hot 100 blends all-genre U.S. streaming (official audio and official video), radio airplay and sales data.

It appears that the rest of the world is checking out the new artist at the top of the charts. "Drivers License" dominated  Billboard Global 200 based on streaming- and sales. While Rodrigo's popularity was boosted in the U.S. by her starring role in High School Musical: The Musical - The Series, her growing fandom globally could be attributed to the interest in America's latest hitmaker.

"There’s truly no direct comparison here," when Spotify's Global Hits lead Becky Bass was asked by Billboard if she could compare Rodrigo's rise. "You do have songs like BTS and 'Dynamite,' or Ariana Grande and '7 Rings,' that come out with just massive first-day numbers. And then you have newer artists like Tones and I with 'Dance Monkey,' or Lil Nas X and 'Old Town Road,' which took a little bit longer to grow into chart-toppers. But in my experience -- and as a team we were just discussing this earlier -- we’ve never seen anything like this, where you do have a newer artist that just comes out of the gate in such a dominant way, and just continues to grow.

"I mean, we were like, 'Whoa, these first day numbers are huge!' she continued. "And then they were bigger the second day, bigger the third day… so it really feels unprecedented, and likely is unprecedented."