Good morning, angels and girls with skin like puff pastry! Olivia Rodrigo’s sophomore album GUTS is finally here, and it’s giving all the 2000s pop-rock vibes Rodrigo’s been honing for months. With angsty hits like “bad idea right?” on the tracklist, it’s surprising that the song that’s gotten the entire internet’s attention overnight is a soft-spoken confessional called “lacy” — and Rodrigo’s not talking about clothes.
The singer is known for immortalizing what it’s like to be a Gen Z girl in her music with honest, relatable lyrics. Rodrigo posted a TikTok upon GUTS’s release asserting that every lyric on the album is exactly how she feels. She didn’t directly call out “lacy,” but like all fanbases raised in the era of Taylor Swift’s Easter eggs, Livies were quick to listen to the track with a sharp set of ears. Rodrigo’s lyrics keep the identity of the song’s namesake under wraps, but I’ve got three theories about who Lacy really is.
Lacy Is Rodrigo’s Girl Crush — Platonically
Have you ever thought someone was so cool, you just needed to be friends with them? “Lacy” might be about Rodrigo’s experience with a common phenomenon in female friendships: having a platonic girl crush.
Throughout the song, Rodrigo sings Lacy’s praises while harboring a guilt-tinged envy toward her. The sweet guitar plucking in the background balances equally envious and admiring comments like, “I despise my rotten mind and how much it worships you.” With other self-admittedly jealous songs on her discography (ahem, “jealousy, jealousy”), Rodrigo’s clearly comfortable singing about her complicated feelings toward people her age.
If you choose to believe this theory, “lacy” enters a canon of girl crush songs like Conan Gray’s “Heather,” Dolly Parton’s “Jolene,” and Little Big Town’s aptly titled “Girl Crush.” Rodrigo’s in good company.
Lacy Is Rodrigo’s Girl Crush — literally
Rodrigo’s never publicly labeled her sexuality, but some fans are convinced that “lacy” is her coming out song. She sings directly to Lacy about how she simultaneously loves and hates her (Rodrigo’s pen ink was flowing when she wrote, “I see you everywhere / The sweetest torture one could bear!”). Its lyrics lean into sapphic territory with admissions like, “I despise my jealous eyes and how hard they fell for you.”
It’s important to remember that fans will never know Rodrigo’s sexuality for sure until the star confirms it herself (and pressuring her to make a statement might do more harm than good). Still, many Livies, especially those in the LGBTQ+ community, have taken to X to claim “lacy” as a queer anthem.
Lacy is the image of Rodrigo that exists in the public eye
Let’s get philosophical for a second. What if, instead of referencing an actual girl named Lacy, Rodrigo is singing about the celebrity version of herself? SOUR’s success launched her into the public eye at just 18 years old. She’s been compared to stars like Taylor Swift and Avril Lavigne since the beginning of her music career, and GUTS might be the most anticipated second album of the 2020s so far. That’s a lot of pressure to put on a 20-something teenage girl.
Rodrigo calls Lacy a “dazzling starlet” in the second verse, which might allude to the shiny version of herself that she shows the public. She tells Lacy that she “feels [her] compliments like bullets on skin.” If Rodrigo thinks of Lacy as her curated alter ego, then the praise she gets when she’s “performing” as Lacy might not feel like it’s aimed at the real her. If this theory is correct, “lacy” might be Rodrigo’s most vulnerable track yet.
Rodrigo chooses to keep her real-life music inspo private, so fans will have to keep theorizing who “lacy” is about. All I know for sure is that if Rodrigo ever said I was “made of angel dust,” I’d float to heaven on the spot.