hopeless fountain kingdom (Deluxe) - Halsey

The Child Of Modern Pop Culture Music

Reviews are back in full force! Let us get started with the now nationally recognized artist, Halsey. If you still don't know who this is, she is the one featured in the ridiculously overplayed "Closer" by The Chainsmokers.

Now let's look at her new album hopeless fountain kingdom (Deluxe). In reality? It isn't horrible, it is just totally uninspired, it sounds exactly like every other generic pop song possible created by lazy producers and singers from the last two years. I know I'll get a lot of hate because everyone on Youtube loves it apparently, but I'm sticking by my guns. However, there are songs like "Alone" and "Devil In Me" which step a little bit out of mediocrity and are actually alright, but the rest of the album is just a blur.

To start on the specifics, her vocals are almost identical throughout the album. The music that accompanies her vocals do just that, accompany her. For most songs, there are fairly similar sound percussion, synths and other random noises which end up being only somewhat interesting background noise. 

Another notable thing is that Halsey's tone and tempo are almost impossible to differ from song to song. If you were to play the album in the background of a party, I'm sure some people will ask if the music is on repeat because of how repetitive it is from start to finish. The music isn't horrible or annoying, it is just dull and goes nowhere, the album is 16 tracks long for some reason, it could have been only four tracks and had the exact same deliverable altogether.

So my recommendations are to genuinely listen to the tracks "Alone" and "Devil In Me" and then go to her previous album BADLANDS which is far more interesting.

Originality: 3

Instruments: 5

Vocals: 3

Longevity: 4

Red Score: 3.7

Crash - Usher

An Unfortunate Wreck

Usher used to be king of RnB and Pop and he still is very much in the game, I would to pay money to see him and some other people at a show for sure. Those days of creating new music are mostly over though, or at least with this song, it shows that Usher is running out of steam. He still has talent for sure, but this song is not a good show of it. Let’s break down why this song does not stand out at all. First, the bass of the song and throughout is a great sound, but it doesn’t really do anything, it feels like it is the same few notes and just long strings of synth pad. The other slight drums and various parts don’t stick out. If I wasn’t listening for them, I wouldn’t be able to recall that they are there at all. It isn’t like I haven’t listened to the song much, I listened to it at least 10 times from beginning to end, and I literally can’t recall any melody or and instruments specifically or any tune. After the bland hip-hop slowish music, let’s look at Usher’s singing. His falsetto is good, just like in other songs, but it loses any meaning after using it throughout the whole song and it becomes almost non-existent as it slips behind the other noise in the song. His other parts of the song are forgettable and just filler for the time. The song sounds like a bridge from another song, but just elongated for 3 and a half minutes. It isn’t really horrible, just bland and feels unfinished and blatantly unnecessary. I would recommend just listening to “Yeah” again and skipping this song altogether.   

Originality: 3.2

Instruments: 4.7

Vocals: 4.9

Longevity: 2.5

Red Score: 3.8