Even though I can admit that I struggle to stay informed about most musicians and relevant pop culture, I am someone whose mood can be easily influenced by music. When Olivia Rodrigo’s Sour came out, it simultaneously left me feeling powerful and also heartbroken. It was the perfect album to come out at the end of May, and it became my anthem for finishing my senior year of high school.
Now that hot girl summer has finally come to an end, I was fully ready to embrace the cardigans and hot apple cider and good vibes fall always seems to bring. But with Taylor Swift’s highly anticipated RED: Taylor’s Version coming out November 12, and Adele’s fourth studio album 30 releasing only a week later on November 19, all hopes of light-hearted autumn have been metaphorically thrown out the window.
Now, it’s time for Sad Girl Fall.
After a summer with uplifting and empowering music (Kacey Musgraves’ breadwinner immediately comes to mind), it only makes sense to slow it down and allow ourselves to revel in the heavy emotions we all have been holding in.
Although November feels late to truly begin such a season, Sad Girl Fall does not have a set beginning and end. It is a frame of mind, similar to Hot Girl Summer, where it is okay to take a moment to be sad and embrace the ugly tears. And it can stretch past the end of the year and into the winter months, and it may not let up until it begins to get warmer again.
The fall and winter months have always felt like the better time for sad music. Whether it be because things begin to slow down in our lives or the cold that drives us towards sadness, it has become a trend for artists to release their emotional ballads and heartbreaking melodies from November through the first half of March.
A great example of this is Olivia Rodrigo (can you tell I really love her music?) and the three singles she released before her whole album became available. “Driver’s License,” which came out in January, is one of the most heart-breaking tracks, and its massive popularity most likely derives from its perfect release date.
Right after the holidays, I have always dealt with this weird feeling of loneliness, stemming from the end of a long stretch of family-centered holidays. Even if you have never been in a relationship, “Driver’s License” encapsulates a level of pain the loss of anyone can deliver, whether it be an estranged family member, an ex-best friend, or anyone else you’ve felt like you’ve lost.
From what we have already heard from these albums, “Easy on Me” was an absolutely moving single, playing into its heartbreaking melody and the vocal mastery Adele possesses. Most of us are also no strangers to Swift’s ability to write a strong breakup song. In her first announcement about the album, Swift noted that RED was “all over the place, a fractured mosaic of feelings that somehow all fit together in the end. Happy, free, confused, lonely, devastated, euphoric, wild, and tortured by memories past.”
Knowing that both Taylor Swift and Adele are extremely capable of hitting you right in the heart with their music, it would be wise to mentally and emotionally prepare for both of these albums. If this is only the beginning of Sad Girl Fall, we are in for a hell of a ride.