I first heard Halsey’s “You Should Be Sad” a couple weeks ago when the music video premiered on YouTube. It made sense that YouTube’s algorithm would recommend it: I love Halsey’s voice and an increasingly growing number of her songs are on heavy rotation in my car. So naturally I had to give “You Should Be Sad” a listen.
The first thing I noticed during that first listen is that this song really refuses to be put in a box stylistically. It’s driven by an acoustic guitar with a fun, laid-back rhythm, and Halsey wears a cowboy hat (and not much else) in the music video. But it’s still very much a Halsey song, with her power-pop/soft rock ballad voice. Although these stylistic contradictions were tricky to listen to on first play, I was definitely singing along to the chorus the second time it came around. She’s a couple albums deep into her career now (this single is tied to the release of ‘Manic’) so naturally she wants to expand her horizons and try new things. Keeping your music interesting and evolving as an artist means taking some risks; Halsey’s never had the play-it-safe personality, after all.
Lyrically, it seems like a continuation of the general theme of “Without Me”: all you ever did was put me down when I’m the one who “put you up there”. Good luck on your own, etc. Halsey denied in interviews that “Without Me” had anything to do with her break up with G-Eazy. I don’t know how she can deny it for “You Should Be Sad”. It’ll be blowing out my car speakers regardless.
I first heard Halsey’s “You Should Be Sad” a couple weeks ago when the music video premiered on YouTube. It made sense that YouTube’s algorithm would recommend it: I love Halsey’s voice and an increasingly growing number of her songs are on heavy rotation in my car. So naturally I had to give “You Should Be Sad” a listen.
The first thing I noticed during that first listen is that this song really refuses to be put in a box stylistically. It’s driven by an acoustic guitar with a fun, laid-back rhythm, and Halsey wears a cowboy hat (and not much else) in the music video. But it’s still very much a Halsey song, with her power-pop/soft rock ballad voice. Although these stylistic contradictions were tricky to listen to on first play, I was definitely singing along to the chorus the second time it came around. She’s a couple albums deep into her career now (this single is tied to the release of ‘Manic’) so naturally she wants to expand her horizons and try new things. Keeping your music interesting and evolving as an artist means taking some risks; Halsey’s never had the play-it-safe personality, after all.
Lyrically, it seems like a continuation of the general theme of “Without Me”: all you ever did was put me down when I’m the one who “put you up there”. Good luck on your own, etc. Halsey denied in interviews that “Without Me” had anything to do with her break up with G-Eazy. I don’t know how she can deny it for “You Should Be Sad”. It’ll be blowing out my car speakers regardless.