A feverish rush of indie pop intensity, HALIE’s song “Starved” hits back hard at prejudice and close-mindedness, asserting our universal right to love whoever we want to love, regardless of gender, race, religion, etc.
Stream: “Starved” – HALIE
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Maybe one day people can love who they love, no matter their sex, their race, how they look, their religion. People should celebrate love, not punish it.
Fervent, unrelenting energy surrounds HALIE’s latest single, and for good reason: It’s an outburst of ire and frustration at those who don’t accept others for who they are and who they love. A feverish rush of indie pop intensity, “Starved” hits back hard at prejudice and close-mindedness, asserting our universal right to love whoever we want to love, regardless of gender, race, religion, etc.
Little, so little
That tiny narrow mind is stupid
Colors, no colors
Nothing good shines through your eyes
Yeah, you are starved
You are cold
You love to feel control
You want blood
You won’t stop
You hate the rainbow souls
Atwood Magazine is proud to be premiering “Starved,” the final single from HALIE’s forthcoming debut EP Good Kids (out February 21, 2020). Introducing her music back in 2017, HALIE is the indie pop project of Norwegian eighteen-year-old Hannah Emilie Grung. Self-described as “marrying the pop sensibility of Charli XCX and defiance of early Lorde,” HALIE’s songs have always been tinged with a certain unapologetic urgency – starting with her debut singles “Echo” and “Youth,” and continuing through the present day.
Out Friday, the Good Kids EP is a little bit synthpop, a little bit Europop, and a little bit trap all mixed into one. What shines through it most is this young artist’s conviction: She knows better than most teenagers what she wants her art to mean and to be. “The EP in whole is about emotions you can get though your whole life, but I think it’s a little heightened in your teenage years,” HALIE tells Atwood Magazine. “It is about love, anger, strength, the utter confusion of people with old-school vision, and for switching to a better attitude for 2020.”
She jokes, “You gotta love a teenage brain.”
Following enticing singles like “Good Kids” and January’s release “New Fears,” “Starved” is one of the most refreshing and biting numbers off HALIE’s nascent catalog, finding her guns a’blazing against prejudiced views not limited to, but focused around love.
“‘Starved’ is about my utter disbelief of people not accepting LOVE,” she says. “I feel people like that are quite starved, and that is how my song came to life. I just simply can’t understand how people can hate something so grand. It is quite stupid. Maybe one day people can love who they love, no matter their sex, their race, how they look, their religion. People should celebrate love, not punish it.”
We feel HALIE’s pointed critique shine through her song’s visceral attitude:
Cunning, so cunning
You really need to find some love, cause
I don’t really understand,
how you can hate something so grand
you, you, you, oh you
You really need someone
to show all the love we got for us
you, you, you, oh you
Co-written with HALIE’s guitarist Mathias Marstrander and drummer Martin Wright Thorsen, “Starved” is deliberately intense – a show of force to accompany the heated lyrical defense of personal freedom and liberty.
On the song’s inspiration, HALIE explains: “One of my Facebook friends had written: ‘ten reasons not to go to the Pride parade’. Why?! Why ruin the one good thing that some people have? You get so disappointed that people of your own age can think like that. Don’t you have anything better to do than hate on a pride parade?” To quote the artist, they are starved:
People, oh people
We never do shut up and listen
Equal, we’re equal
It is the main thing that’s given
Oh they are starved
They are cold
They love to feel control
They want blood
They won’t stop
They hate the rainbow souls
She may be young, but HALIE already has a wealth of wisdom to share with her peers and adults alike. Stream “Starved” exclusively on Atwood Magazine, and listen to the Good Kids EP upon its release this Friday!
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Stream: “Starved” – HALIE
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