Halsey is one of the biggest pop stars in the world and the biggest pop stars tend to have the longest album rollouts. Although her third album, Manic, will only be released on January 17, 2020, we're already receiving its third single. The album's first single, "Without Me", was released last year and attained the top spot on Billboard's Hot 100 in January, making it her first #1 as a lead artist.
Despite premiering Manic's second single, "Graveyard", at Rihanna's Savage x Fenty show just a few weeks ago, Halsey decided to drop "Clementine" today in honour of her 25th birthday. "Clementine" is a stripped-back track, driven by simple piano tinkling and some subtle clunking for percussion. It can be deemed as the centrepiece of Manic for thematic reasons. Every line contradicts the previous, constantly pulling in opposite directions while evidencing a clarity that holds it all together. Halsey is "constantly havin' a breakthrough... or a breakdown." She boasts, "In my world, I'm seven feet tall," yet "people on the street don't know my name." The contradictions of the chorus are accentuated by Halsey echoing herself in disparate voices. One is melancholic, the other exuberant. She independently declares that she doesn't need anyone and then immediately after shrinks with the confession that she "just [needs] everyone and then some."
Watch the music video for "Clementine" below, in which Halsey is joined by her brother to do some interpretive dancing at an aquarium.
