Hopeless Fountain Kingdom
Halsey
Astralwerks / Capitol
Three stars
On her sober second album, Halsey is stretching herself with a new collection. It’s a complex, sober, riskier CD brimming with heartbreak from one of pop’s most exciting artists.
Halsey is frustrated and broken on all 13 of the tracks, many of which are surprisingly spare. Sorry is mostly her and a piano, gorgeously done. Lie, featuring Quavo of Migos, and Walls Could Talk are more song fragments, wisely left alone. Hopeless is just a whisper of a song. The spoken-word driven Good Mourning clocks in at just over a minute.
She lets her rock voice out to great effect in Bad at Love and she melds nicely with Fifth Harmony's Lauren Jauregui on the techno-flavoured lovers' duet Strangers. Alone marries anguished lyrics to a peppy Donna Summer-like arrangement.
The Weeknd gets a songwriting credit on the ghostly Eyes Closed and Sia gets one for the very Sia-like Devil in Me.
Hopeless Fountain Kingdom may not have huge anthems – the closest is the exquisitely sad Now or Never – but it's just as satisfying.
* Associated Press