The Grudge (song)
Some music critics were positive about the vulnerability, lyrics, and Rodrigo's vocal performance on "The Grudge", while others thought it was too melodramatic and self-centered.
Two months later, Rodrigo gave Swift and the co-writers of her song "Cruel Summer" songwriting credits on her own single "Deja Vu" (2021) without an explanation.
[10] She conceived the follow-up album, Guts (2023), at the age of 19, while experiencing "lots of confusion, mistakes, awkwardness & good old fashioned teen angst".
[12] Nigro produced every single track included on the album, which were the more rock-oriented songs, as Rodrigo felt they drew a bigger reaction from live audiences.
[23] Rodrigo performed "The Grudge" at the Ace Hotel Los Angeles on October 9, 2023, in a concert exclusively for American Express cardholders.
[34] Pitchfork's Cat Zhang believed she sang with "sky-scraping vocals", and Clash's Alex Berry thought she employed a "raw, raspy tone" along with a belting technique.
Some believed the song was about Rodrigo facing rejection from a love interest[39] or dealing with a difficult breakup in a romantic relationship.
Club's Mary Kate Carr believed "The Grudge" was inspired by the situation between Rodrigo and Swift after the songwriting credits incident.
[43][44] Elle and Stephanie Soteriou of BuzzFeed News opined that the timeline of the phone call in the lyrics aligned with the release of Sour, which was a Friday in May 2021.
Rob Sheffield of Rolling Stone described the song as "one of the toughest, angriest, most fearsome power ballads" on the album, and Jessie Atkinson of GQ called it one of the record's numerous instances of profound vulnerability.
Zhang believed they were not inherently bad but regurgitated Rodrigo's prior material compared to other tracks on Guts, which demonstrated a greater increase in self-awareness.
[29] Beats Per Minute's Lucas Martins and Billboard Philippines's Gabriel Saulog thought "The Grudge" was effective in capturing its lyrical theme and displayed good songwriting but did not compare to the high points of the album.
[33][41] Charles Lyons-Burt of Slant Magazine considered it a misstep and believed it leaned into "soapy melodrama" due to Rodrigo's self-centered storytelling.
[32] Spencer Kornhaber of The Atlantic believed the song was overly maudlin, generic, and one of the ballads where Rodrigo's straightforwardness can be vexing.
[48] Sheffield ranked it as Rodrigo's 12th-best song in September 2023 and picked his favorite line: "We both drew blood, but man, those cuts were never equal.
[30][31] Billboard's Jason Lipshutz thought Rodrigo beautifully portrayed her vulnerability and delivered the song's final line hauntingly before it faded into nothingness.
[52] "The Grudge" received a silver certification in the United Kingdom from the British Phonographic Industry, and the Official Charts Company declared it Rodrigo's 18th-biggest song in the country in February 2024.
