Halsey’s scattershot ‘HFK’ defies more than genre
Mini-epics and borrowed styles mark new album
Ask Google what “alternative music” means in 2017, and “Halsey” will pop up — along with names like Imagine Dragons, Paramore and Lorde. No longer reserved for bands that sound like Nirvana, alternative has become the genre of music that doesn’t have a genre. That’s precisely why Halsey has embraced the term, one that’s perfect for a 22-year-old who’s not a fan of labels, particularly the “tri-bi” moniker she’s been slapped with: biracial, bisexual and bipolar. The singer’s new album Hopeless Fountain Kingdom (out Friday) the follow-up to her platinum 2013 debut Badlands, is another album of vividly-narrated pop/R&B songs that bets on its compelling narrator outshining its less-than-distinctive music. In that way, Halsey just might be the future of pop music.
Like so many other teens raised in the suburbs, Halsey (née Ashley Nicolette Frangipane) found early inspiration in mid-2000s albums that told dramatic tales of love and destruction. The first generation to come of age with the Internet, Halsey’s peers cobbled together their first music libraries from blogs and file-sharing services, a hodgepodge of a listening experience that rendered the distinctions between music genres obsolete.
Halsey took away a crucial lesson from the alt-rock artists of her youth, that music is only as good as the emotions it sparks. Sporting tattoos, a buzzcut and an open sexuality, Halsey built a massive following by positioning herself as an alternative to other young stars. Hopeless Fountain
Kingdom is less interested in a defining musical aesthetic than an emotional one, with Hopeless be- ing the title’s optimum word, its songs a series of hard-partying, Shakespearean mini-epics.
As for what HFK actually sounds like, that’s less clear. The album doesn’t contain any immediate earworms like Closer, her megahit with the Chainsmokers. Instead, she borrows magpie-like from other stars’ sounds, with some working better than others, particularly the tracks that team up with Adele and Sia producer Greg Kurstin; Halsey’s voice shines on Adele-style piano ballad
Sorry, and the Sia-esque flourishes on Strangers and Devil in Me (which Sia co-wrote) elevate the tracks to among the album’s best.
Less effective are tracks that sound like castoffs from other pop stars. Eyes Closed, co-written by the Weeknd, sounds like Halsey singing karaoke from his catalog. Most concerning is Lie, her collaboration with Quavo. The Migos rapper has a much-publicized history of using homophobic slurs, so why Halsey, who has won so many fans with her outspoken bisexuality, invited him on her album is puzzling.
Compare that with Strangers with Fifth Harmony’s Lauren Jauregui, which Halsey heralded as the first love duet between queer women with radio potential (Jauregui also identifies as bisexual). Both Strangers and Bad at Love hint at same-sex relationships, further positioning Halsey as a key figure helping to make mainstream pop a little less straight.
However, if Halsey’s queer, mixed-race, genreless status is the future of pop music, her Quavo misstep hints at the mistakes that endanger stars who hedge their compelling identities. Halsey’s public presence may have won her mainstream acclaim, but ultimately, it can’t save her.