Singer Halsey Hits USC like a Hurricane

The songstress sat down with fans at the University of Southern California in a Samsung-sponsored exclusive interview

It’s not every day that your musical idol pops up on your college campus, trailed by cameras. But that’s exactly what happened for some USC fans of Ashley Frangipane, better known by her stage name Halsey. The singer and songwriter appeared at the Southern California campus on February 5, with little prior warning from her publicity machine, to grant an informal 40-minute interview with Bieber videographer Rory Kramer in front of over 100 fans. The event was part of Halsey’s juggernaut tour for her debut album Badlands, released in August 2015, and was sponsored by the Samsung Level Music Lab.

Though Halsey hasn’t yet achieved household name recognition, even an unadvertised appearance leads to a double line of fans stretched around the corner, vibrating with anticipation of her appearance. “She feels like 2016 to me,” said Jamison Baken, a 19-year-old music production student. In fact, Halsey’s heavily produced, shimmering cinematic sound has turned the 21 year-old into the new pop sensation for the under-twenty set. Empowered by a kitten-rasp voice that packs an emotional gut punch at the velocity of jet fuel, she is an electropop protagonist who is by turns heartbreakingly insecure and ferociously victorious. But the real propellant for Halsey’s rising star is her millions of social media followers, a small slice of who greet her entrance with an ear-splitting roar of affection.

On stage, Halsey is unfiltered and focused. With fans, Halsey is artfully unguarded, a high-wire balance between corporate interest in her millions of dollars of earning potential, and actual authenticity. It’s an act she handles with aplomb, thanks in large part to her unaffected desire to connect with each peer in the audience. “I have no fucking idea what I’m doing,” she admits to a rapt sea of upturned faces, before imploring them to reject the idea that success is about doing everything right. “You need to care less about the formula and more about your instinct,” said Halsey. “Use your instinct to take you as far as you can, and along that journey, just spread a message and don’t be silent.” When Kramer tries to end the interview, she forces the proceedings to a halt and turns to her fans. “On the count of three I want you guys to all scream what you want to be when you grow up.” And on her count of three, the whole audience does.

Highlights of Halsey’s panel:

• Her dream collaboration is with Drake, Brand New, or Kanye West. But she’s open to being surprised.
• She cried in the back of an Escalade when people were negative about her Justin Bieber, “Love Yourself” cover, but is now glad of the experience, because she learned perspective from it
• Badlands was an escape album allowing her to hide from her parents’ split, and the death of her little brother’s best friend
• She jokingly put a picture of Bernie Sanders on the giant Samsung screen behind her, then seriously asked students to use their voice no matter whom they vote for
• The audience explodes into giggles when she’s asked to choose between babysitting North West, Blue Ivy, or Saint West. She picks North West.

-Arielle Samuelson

Photo Credit: Arielle Samuelson