(Note: As mentioned in previous stories, Halsey uses both she/they pronouns.)
Halsey is currently touring in support of their fourth studio album, If I Can’t Have Love, I Want Power. She released that album and its companion film in August 2021. The album is a concept album, partially about her pregnancy, and came about pretty quickly after the release of Manic in January 2020. All this to say, Halsey has been a prolific musician recently and has even more new material to release. If only her label would allow it. Halsey took to TikTok on Sunday morning to explain that the label won’t let them release a new song they love unless they also manufacture a viral moment on TikTok.
Halsey vented her frustrations at her record label in a TikTok on Sunday morning, claiming that they’re being blocked from releasing a “song I love” for marketing reasons. “Basically, I have a song that I love that I want to release ASAP, but my record label won’t let me,” reads the text starting the 29-second clip.
With the unreleased track apparently playing in the background and a frown on their face, Halsey (who uses she/they pronouns) continued: “I’ve been in this industry for eight years and I’ve sold over 165 million records and my record company is saying I can’t release [the song] unless they can fake a viral moment on TikTok.”
Reps for Halsey and their label, Astralwerks/Capitol, did not immediately respond to Variety‘s requests for comment on Sunday. The irony of Halsey creating a viral TikTok moment claiming that their label will not release the song without a viral TikTok moment was not lost on observers.
As more artists have begun to see success with the TikTok algorithm, it’s no secret that labels and artist teams have started manufacturing “viral moments” on the platform in order to up the buzz surrounding a release or project.
“Everything is marketing,” concluded Halsey’s Tiktok, “and they are doing this to every artist these days. I just want to release music, man and I deserve better tbh. I’m tired.”
In the comments, fans pointed out that this post could serve as the viral marketing moment, to which Halsey replied: “Bruh I wish it was haha. They just said I have to post tiktoks they didn’t specifically say “about what” so here I am 😂😃.” She also said the label specifically wanted six videos. That’s a lot of material. The song is playing in the background of the video they did post. From what I can hear of the lyrics, it definitely sounds like an angsty breakup song. Maybe the label was hoping Halsey would post about past relationship drama. Their personal life is pretty stable now with a partner and child, so it seems unlikely this song is about Alev. They probably don’t want to invoke any slimy exes at this point. Also, even fake drama seems like unnecessary added stress on top of touring for someone who is already having health struggles. Halsey is probably popular enough and doesn’t need a fake TikTok moment to get the song trending, but they technically did do what the label wanted. Halsey just followed the spirit instead of the letter of the law. And gave us a glimpse of the wizard behind the curtains.
@halsey I’m tired
One thing about Halsey is they are a chameleon. I can’t recognize her from picture to picture sometimes. Interesting. I hope her health gets better.
I thought the pic was of Heidi Montag at first glance!
The song is about Alev
One thing I’m curious about and would like to understand (hopefully it doesn’t come out as offensive):
I completely understand rejecting gender pronouns for people who don’t want to be perceived as either men or women, and I understand not wanting to be defined by typical gender roles. But CIS women who don’t want to use the ”she” pronoun while still maintaining very ”traditionally female” looks, way of dressing, lifestyle, relationships etc.? I’ve seen this with a few celebrities lately.
Totally support everyone’s right to be who and whatever they want to be, just curious what choosing to identify as ”they” changes/adds in these situations.
(Perhaps I don’t understand the nuances of this issue completely as my mother tongue doesn’t use gendered pronouns. Once again, it’s not my intention to offend but to understand.)
Well, Halsey says it herself: for some folks, it’s all just marketing.
Great question. There’s a couple of ways to answer that. Here’s one: Gender can be more than an externally-facing role– it can be an inner knowing. I don’t know your gender identity, but let’s say you’re a woman who uses she/her pronouns. If you spent a month on an oil rig, and decided for safety and practical reasons, you were going to wear men’s clothes and present as bro-ey as possible– would that make you less of a woman? Of course not. In your heart, you’d know that you are a woman.
Gender is complex and it has many components. My husband is nonbinary, but he uses mostly he/him pronouns and moves through the world with a male persona. He’s not in the closet, but he’s most comfortable keeping his female persona private in the intimacy of our relationship. When my husband is a woman, she’s fully a woman. It’s a profound shift in the energy of her eyes, how she holds her body, how her body feels to me, her voice, her energy, her way of moving in the world. I can imagine someone like him wanting to use they/them pronouns, even though they’re publicly mostly presenting as male, to honor the full spectrum of who they are.
I’m nonbinary as well, and I experience myself as sometimes male and sometimes female. On days I’m female, I might dress feminine, but I’m still nonbinary because there are other days when I’m fully male (and I do generally present male when I’m male).
It’s complicated. We’re unpeeling something solidified by years of tradition and patriarchy and trauma. I think this work matters for nonbinary people, but I think it matters for people who are not nonbinary too. It opens up new ways of relating to the self and our inner knowings and the way we move through the world.
This is unbelievably beautiful. Thank you for sharing your truth with us. Xx
That’s a great explanation.
Destinationroad – wow thank you for your patient, beautiful and thoughtful answer! ❤️
I use she/her pronouns and am not “traditionally” feminine looking at all. I wear exclusively jeans/sweatpant + t shirts. Never wear makeup, vary rarely wear any jewelry, don’t “do” my hair, and wear gender neutral shoes. I’ve been told (by men) I walk like I’m ready to pick a fight, am aggressive, and have bossy energy. I grew up being asked if I’m a lesbian, I’m not and probably worse off for it. Should I use they/them pronouns just because I don’t present outwardly as feminine even though I identify as a woman internally? It’s the same for Halsey. Her/their outward presentation might have little to do with how they feel about themselves internally.
Some more thoughts! I identify as an intersex woman. By most measures I look like a cis woman, but i have high testosterone. I was listening to the phenomenal activist Sean Saifa Wall on Instagram and he was proposing that we think of intersex people not just by the western medical definition – people whose genitals don’t fit within a certain box – but more broadly to also encompass hormonal variability. And I realized that was how I see myself – an intersex woman. I am high femme, but in the drag queen sense. There were aspects of having high testosterone that were pathologized when I was a teenager, if people had understood my hormones my diagnoses would have been different.
So that’s to say, gender (and sex) are about more than how you look. If someone is nonbinary (or enby), they ARE even if they still choose to look “cis”. They are not cis because of their outward presentation. How you identify and how you present are different. Harry Styles might choose to wear a dress every day but still identify as a cis man. Gender is not a performance (unless you want it to be!)
One more layer – being non-binary doesn’t look a certain way. It doesn’t have to be about looking “both” male and female or androgynous. It means that you do not feel like binary gender categories encompass you. Many people reject the binary because it is a colonial legacy for them and not part of their pre colonial culture. You can do that work without having to add elements of masculinity or femininity to your personality. Ericka Hart and Alok Venom have some really excellent scholarship on the racial and political history of gender.
And lastly I’ll add – I think also what this question gets at is who gets to take up space. I think everyone should interrogate and explore gender, no matter who they are. But leadership should come from the most impacted. I am white, AFAB, and have not had any medical interventions regarding being intersex (except that I take testosterone now because they fixed the medical condition that was making it high and I felt bad after that). The people who should lead and take up the most space are Black, Indigenous and POC people who are visibly trans, visible GNC. They are the people who are the most impacted by violence and material consequences. This is where being enby being “trendy” can cause harm.
Thank you for sharing. I will look up the colonial aspects of gender.
I feel like this post was viral marketing. I guess both could be true: being forced to do a viral post and criticizing the label for it.
I mean, this seems to be exactly what the label was looking for, so well done I guess.
165 million records!!!!????…How are records counted these days? That sounds like a ton of records for someone not even a household name. Those sound like Swifty and Rihanna numbers.
I’m not sure how her records are marketed but my daughter just bought 11 versions of the same kpop album (not even BTS) just to get all the different freebees that came with each version.
This post WAS the viral marketing. While I’m sure artists truly feel pressure to engage on social media and all that, I think the marketing for younger artists has shifted to “my big mean label is making me do XYZ” so that fans feel like they’re supporting the (successful millionaire) underdog. Labels wouldn’t just let their artists go wild and start talking smack about them on social media.