“I’m headed straight for the castle / They wanna make me their queen”- announces Halsey’s haunting vocal over a destructive bassline in the chorus of ‘Castle’, the opening track of her highly anticipated debut album Badlands. A statement that may hold true, as she embarks on a sold-out North American headlining tour, has accumulated roughly 400,000 Twitter followers in the past six months, and debuts at #2 on the album sales chart with 100,000 copies of Badlands sold, with previously just a five-track EP (Room 93) to her name.
Badlands is a concept record, lyrically and sonically crafted to fit an overall theme, the Badlands: a desolate, booming metropolis in a post-apocalyptic world, a physical metaphor to Halsey’s state of mind. The diverse, but cohesive tracks, incorporate many themes, such as the inevitable love and heartbreak, Halsey’s fight in the music industry, and interestingly, her struggles with her bipolar mental disorder. In fact, Halsey herself dubbed the album an “angry, female record”.
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TNt28Tx-cw0&w=740&h=422]
You may have already heard it, the first single from the record: ’New Americana’, a satire playing on American icons and culture. ”We are the new Americana / High on legal marijuana / Raised on Biggie and Nirvana” goes the powerful, choir-chanted chorus, sung over rolling marching band-esque drums. Halsey references famous artists The Notorious B.I.G. and Nirvana, both representative of her biracial upbringing, as well as actor James Dean, using him to give a face to the newly accepted-even celebrated- homosexuality in the New Americana culture, considered taboo in his time.
Executively produced by artist Lido, Badlands is a landscape successfully painted with the use of textural sounds and various vocal effects, creating a feeling of claustrophobia in some songs, or contrastingly, a wide-open terrain in others. ‘Drive’ recalls this idea, being the most sonically interesting song on the record, as it incorporates the many sound effects of a car, i.e. the engine roar to add to the bass, the ejecting cassette for spacial awareness,… all to finally create a romantically naïve love story between two individuals on the road.
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=heMTVlawFmM&w=740&h=422]
Other fan favourites include the hopeful road trip anthem ‘Roman Holiday’ (or as I like to call it, the new ‘Teenage Dream’) and the very descriptive ’Colors’, a song about ex-boyfriend Matt Healy (singer from The 1975) brimming with colourful visual imagery. Other stand-out tracks are ‘Gasoline’, an industrial rage-fuelled rebellion against social norms, and ‘Control’, a song purely focused on Halsey’s bipolar disorder, the playful yet eerie melody emphasising the varying episodes of mania and depression that characterise the mental disorder.
As our journey through the Badlands comes to an end, Halsey proves once again she is a true artist with her rendition of “I Walk The Line”, originally by Johnny Cash. Putting her own spin on the song, the talented songstress gives us the power-ballad we’ve all been waiting for, as she is joined by a string orchestra and ends her album with a heart-wrenching and epic bang, leaving us wanting more.
Words by Joshua James Gallacher
@imperialgrey