Singer, songwriter, guitarist, and dauntless free thinker Halsey hung out with fab pop culture curator Rory Kramer and USC student/musician Lani Renaldo at the Samsung Level Music Lab. Together, the three spirited living souls transformed the Trojan lecture hall into a thought-driven forum, approaching such topics as biraciality, gender fluidity, ableism, and the power discovered in freedom of expression. Halsey elaborated on how people who embrace their differences are the emotive elevators raising counter-cultural awareness and sustaining its momentum. The youth are transforming the old top hats cliff hanging on the greying fringes of ex-century American mindsets, and replacing them with signature snapbacks, tie dyed domes, and Gear VR. Halsey is at the head of this class.
Written by ToneSwep
Images by Jackie Lee
“I was hiding from everything by working on the album,” Halsey expresses, sharing the cathartic creative process behind her stellar debut album - Badlands. “Instead of dealing with all the sh!t that was going on in my real life, I ran off and I hid in my album.” Without any guest features and with every song written by the artist, the Gold-certified ground-breaker serves as a guideline into contemporary youth culture. Throughout the album, Halsey, 21, explores a fictional dystopian society known as The Badlands. Inspired by post-apocalyptic films like The Fifth Element and Blade Runner, Badlands is an artistic manifestation of the singer’s state of mind - the interpretive explanation of existing on a metaphorical island that is limited in scope, surrounded by water representative of role rigidity and shackling social convention, and trapped by the absence of identity diversity or a wealth of optimistic options. The album sent a message which was meaningful to many. Halsey’s music advocates that change is attainable when progression remains the goal. “Nothing is permanent,” a firm optimism within her words. “And everything has the potential for change.”