Seeing an artist in person that has changed your life through their music is something that I believe everyone in this world deserves to experience once in their lifetime. However, seeing an artist for the second time in the location that their debut album was based on is an experience that I could never ask for, but rather be forever grateful for.

Ever since 2016 when Halsey entered my life through a “Top Albums” chart on iTunes, her electric blue hair and fluffy pink coat shouting at me, I have been able to share and be a part of a woman’s love stories, heartbreak stories, and everything in between.

From “Badlands” being one of the first albums I was able to bop to in my car, to the “Badlands Tour”, to the drop of “Hopeless Fountain Kingdom”, to the “HFK Tour” I have been on a wild ride with a loving, strong, fighting woman that has faced more in her life than one could ever deserve, while also being courageous enough to share it to the world through her music.

Flash forward to an early morning in January of this year, I was so grateful to say that I had just purchased tickets with one of my best concert friends to see Halsey at Red Rocks for the third time. At the time, I didn’t realize how much this show would affect me, and I definitely was not emotionally prepared to be seeing my Top Played Artist on Spotify again in person.

Quickly, the day of the show came and I again was transported to the kingdom where her newest project had taken place. A kingdom of love, hardship, suffering, growing, accepting, and understanding. The feeling of the first note hitting the Rocks and the roar from the crowd coming from the back all the way to the front was a feeling that I so dearly missed, but was also so grateful to be back in.

Quickly, I began to forget where I was, and was completely immersed in a world that she had created for an hour and a half set. The visuals, the setlist, the costumes, the heartfelt moments before beginning a song where she spoke of her life and opened up to a side of herself that would otherwise remain closed was all breathtaking.

I remember glancing around every so often to see crying fans, smiling fans, screaming fans. People: just like me, all immersed in the same feeling that I was experiencing. A feeling of love, of shock, of pure happiness that could otherwise not be felt. I thought about how this album, this artist, this woman has touched so many different people in so many different ways and I was so grateful to be able to be one of those people.

 

By the end of the show, I felt full of joy and hope. I was thinking about how grateful I was to be able to see such an influential person in my life for another time in concert. My feet were sore, my phone was full of photos and videos, I was hungry, but I didn’t care. I was in a state of mind that I only felt after concerts. A state of mind that I paid money for, drove an hour for, stood three hours for. I was content.

Halsey is a performer. A performer that I will always cherish no matter what is to come in the future.

Halsey is an artist. An artist that I will always listen to no matter how many times I’ve listened to her that day.

Halsey is a woman. A loving, strong, fighting woman that will always be an inspiration and will always affect me and be a part of me.