By Zach Goins
October 8, 2026
Love has a way of changing with the seasons, and Olivia Rodrigo knows this cycle all too well. On The Unraveled Tour in Charlotte Wednesday night, the 23-year-old singer-songwriter took a sea of pink-clad fans on a yearlong journey through the life cycle of a relationship, evoking its emotional highs and lows through teenage angst, turbulence and an increasingly confident rock-and-roll edge.
British rockers Wolf Alice kicked off the evening with a spirited set that moved between dreamy shoegaze and harder-edged alternative rock. The London-based quartet quickly won over the crowd, drawing enthusiastic support throughout their set before delivering a memorable finale with “Don’t Delete the Kisses,” their most recognizable song from their 2017 Mercury Prize-winning album, Visions of a Life. Their dynamic performance set the tone for the rock-heavy evening ahead.
Since her breakout single “drivers license” in 2021, Rodrigo has experienced a meteoric rise, quickly establishing herself as one of pop music’s most compelling young voices. However, the three-time Grammy winner has proven to be far more than a conventional pop star, drawing heavily from ’90s punk, alternative and indie rock to carve out a distinct pop-rock identity of her own. Her third studio album, you seem pretty sad for a girl so in love, released in June, finds Rodrigo exploring the exhilaration and eventual unraveling of a romantic relationship with a newfound sense of maturity, pairing the emotional vulnerability that first propelled her to stardom with a more assured musical perspective.
That emotional journey serves as the foundation for The Unraveled Tour, with 12 of the 24 tracks on the setlist coming from her latest album. The two-hour performance unfolded across five distinct acts — Spring, Summer, Autumn, Winter and, ultimately, the return of Spring — with cinematic interludes and visual transitions illustrating the changing seasons and mirroring the album’s emotional arc.
The show opened in Spring, with the elaborate horseshoe-shaped stage blanketed in thousands of flowers. For the 20 minutes between performances and leading up to Rodrigo’s entrance, the massive video screen showed a pre-recorded scene of her peacefully sleeping among a bed of flowers. As the opening notes of “drop dead” began, the video seamlessly transitioned into reality, revealing Rodrigo lying among the actual flowers onstage. She slowly rose to her feet, and the evening was officially in bloom.
Rodrigo wasted little time making herself at home, covering nearly every inch of the stage by the time she finished her second song, “u + me = <3.” Her playful confidence was infectious, punctuated by exaggerated facial expressions, frequent waves to fans through the arena, and enthusiastic encouragement for the crowd to sing along. During “good 4 u,” she channeled the rebellious energy of a grungy ‘90s MTV music video, belting her lyrics directly into a handheld camera as her close-up filled the arena’s screen.
As Spring gave way to Summer, the budding romance began showing signs of trouble. The infectious “my way” ushered in the new season, while “bad idea right?” provided one of the night’s more humorous moments. During the song, Rodrigo challenged the audience to pause and hold a silent beat following the lyric “I know I should stop, but I can’t.” Charlotte initially succeeded, but the overeager crowd couldn’t resist for long, shouting the next lyric a beat too soon. Rodrigo smiled and laughed off the premature response before picking it back up.
In Autumn, the flowers withering away from the stage as the relationship’s deterioration was brought into sharper focus. During “stupid song,” Rodrigo ventured onto the small B-stage in the back corner of the floor before walking among the crowd and standing on the barricade, giving fans an up-close-and-personal view. Another highlight came during “maggots for brains,” when Rodrigo taught the audience a harmonized duet to sing during the song’s conclusion.
Despite being one of the oldest songs in her catalog, “traitor” sparked one of the evening’s most passionate singalongs, with Rodrigo stretching the song beyond its studio version with soaring vocal runs and subtle melodic variations. Rather than simply recreating her recordings, Rodrigo treated familiar songs as living arrangements, weaving in riffs, runs and unexpected flourishes — even as she sprinted across the stage.
Charlotte also received a special treat with the tour debut of “Can’t Catch Me Now,” Rodrigo’s composition for The Hunger Games: The Ballad of Songbirds & Snakes. The surprise performance drew one of the night’s loudest reactions, giving the Queen City crowd a moment all its own.
Winter finally brought a welcome change of pace, as a baby grand piano appeared onstage allowing Rodrigo to trade the relentless rock energy for a more intimate stretch of performances, including “honeybee,” “favorite crime” and “drivers license.” “Favorite crime” in particular showcased arguably her finest vocals of the evening, with breathtaking runs that transformed the familiar ballad into something entirely new.
The emotional climax arrived with “the cure,” which featured the evening’s most ambitious theatrical moment. Performing from a B-stage in the middle of the pit, Rodrigo belted the refrain, “I’m unraveled,” as water poured from the rafters. Drenched beneath the cascading water, she remained in place as her light blue dress began to dissolve, revealing a striking red outfit underneath. The transformation turned the song into a literal embodiment of the tour’s central metaphor, capturing both the unraveling of a relationship and the emergence of something new in its aftermath.
But, of course, winter never lasts forever.
As spring returned, so did the flowers onstage, with Rodrigo emerging for a final trio of songs: “deja vu,” “all-american bitch” and “expectations.”
For all its elaborate production, cinematic storytelling and theatrical flourishes, the greatest spectacle of The Unraveled Tour was Rodrigo herself. The show may have charted the uncertainty of love and the chaos of coming undone, but by the time the final notes faded Wednesday night, one thing was clear: Olivia Rodrigo has never been more in control.
View this post on Instagram
Setlist:
“drop dead”</span
“u + me = <3”
“so american”
“good 4 u”
“my way”
“serena joy”
“bad idea right?”
“ballad of a homeschooled girl”
“vampire”
“purple”
“stupid song”
“maggots for brains”
“traitor”
“begged”
“Can’t Catch Me Now (Tour Debut)”
“cigarette smoke”
“honeybee”
“favorite crime”
“drivers license”
“less”
“the cure”
“deja vu”
“all-american bitch”
“expectations”
Read next:
