Album: Badlands Artist: Halsey (Astralwerks) 1/2 (out of five)

Edmonton got its first taste of Halsey in June, when she opened for Imagine Dragons at Rexall Place. We’ll get another blast of the blue-haired New Jersey singer on Nov. 30, when she opens for The Weeknd at the same venue. With any luck, Halsey will get to perform more than a few songs since she now has a full-length album, Badlands, to promote. And we mean full (perhaps too full) — 16 songs of synthpop ranging from a spidery, Hunger Games-flavoured opener (Castle) to a moody and almost unrecognizable cover of a Johnny Cash classic (I Walk the Line). Halsey’s own lines are powerful on so many levels — she combines the personal with pop-culture references to capture a larger Zeitgeist. “High on legal marijuana / Raised on Biggie and Nirvana,” her chilly voice declares on New Americana, which refers to her African-American dad and white mom, but could also speak to the growing realization that our musical, cultural and social interests aren’t restricted to one genre/ dimension/class. “You said your mother only smiled on her TV show / You’re only happy when your sorry head is filled with dope / I hope you make it to the day you’re 28 years old,” Halsey laments on Colors, which mourns a couple’s incompatibility in the context of reality shows, drugs and the curse of the 27-year-old musician. Such multi-layered lyrics almost make up for some of the sonic drudgery of Badlands. Five or six of its tunes, including Coming Down and Haunting, feel more like filler than devastating knockouts.