- Madelyn Sipola
Halsey’s, “If I can’t have love, I want power” album review
The long-awaited Halsey album is finally here. Halsey’s last album “hopeless fountain kingdom,” was released in 2017, making “If I Can’t Have Love, I Want Power” Halsey’s first album in almost four years.
Halsey teased her new album with a movie trailer based on her album - yes, you heard that right, Halsey has a whole movie dedicated to her album. Although the movie was not released to the public, she had a one-night-only IMAX premiere of the movie on Aug. 24, 2021.
“If I Can’t Have Love, I Want Power” is a renaissance-themed punk-rock album, running 42 minutes long with 13 songs.
“A concept album about the joys and horrors of pregnancy and childbirth,” said Halsey.
The concept and aesthetic of this album excited me as I waited for its release, however, I wasn’t as impressed as I thought I would be. Halsey is the one artist to me that has never changed who they were when it comes to music. From “Badlands” to “hopeless fountain kingdom,” the songs on those albums were exciting, new, and different but “If I Can’t Have Love, I Want Power” sounds like a mixture of those two albums.
The album starts off strong with the first song, “The Tradition.” The beat and lyrics of the song remind me of the old Halsey, but with some new additions. As the songs go on, it becomes less appealing to me.
The only songs I would suggest listening to are, “The Tradition,” “Whispers,” “I am not a woman, I’m a god” and “Ya’aburnee.” I wish I liked more of the songs, as I am a big Halsey fan, but this album missed the mark for me. I will not listen to it again, but I might listen to some of the songs I listed.
