hurricane

[tiredandlonelymuse]

GASOLINE and DRIVE

double feature. coming soon…

[tiredandlonelymuse]

going through the badlands archive for anniversary celebrations and found these New Americana stills from some set ups that didn’t make the final vid. I love the whiplash of moods lol little baby.

[tiredandlonelymuse]

when it rains it pours,

but how big must a puddle grow

before it is considered a pond?

when does a pond become a lake?

i’m drowning,

but i insist that i’m dry.

insist i couldn’t die.

now every single day is overtime.

is extra credit.

is derealized.

i’m drowning but i

wring my clothes

and promise that i’m dry.

it’s good for the flowers, they say.

that’s very good.

you’ll need them soon.

[tiredandlonelymuse]

The altered timeline of my life has a lot to do with when people *find out* rather than when it *happened*. Sometimes it’s weeks or months later, from a “source” against my desire. Sometimes it’s a year or a few, in a song that will get decoded or I will explain. I’ve retreated into privacy for my own peace of mind, but the strange side effect is the public parallel timeline happening by my side. The animated corpse of past-me (dressed as present-me) doing and feeling and saying things quite some time after I’ve already lived them. I’m on a leash and they’re interpretive dancing through an adapted-for-TV version of it all. Weird. Not bad. Not good, really. Just…weird?

[tiredandlonelymuse]

I mean. Yeah. being thrust into this insane world / business at 18 irrevocably altered my brain chemistry. but I gotta say, I wake up everyday and make a coffee and sit with my son while we have breakfast and I think to myself “you made it out relatively unscathed to this point, kid.” and for that I am grateful beyond measure. all it took was the exhaustion of waking up and self evaluating on a microscopic level for the past 5 years (which nearly killed me) BUT. I’m here. And I have kept it pretty much together (best as I can) as of recent. which is more than 18 year old me would have ever given herself the faith to bet on. Growth and pain and peace on the horizon. You got this.

[tiredandlonelymuse]

I have been quietly living through some of the hardest years of my life. In some ways that you know and in others too fragile to display. I’ll share it when I’m ready in dazzling and terrifying form, as always, on the record. Finally getting the luxury of existential thought now that I have calmed the storms of survival. Love you.

[tiredandlonelymuse]

I’ve been on my knees since I was 5.

In the chapel,

in a bedroom,

in an alley late at night.

Always facing an inflated

godlike

version of some guy.

But as a girl you do what you need to survive.

You open wider, take the body.

Thank your father, you’ve been naughty.

2 Hail Marys, 20 lashings.

“I’ve been sent to punish you for daring to exist.

You will never know a love as meaningful as this.”

I’ve memorized

the lines

since I was 10.

From the Bible,

from the playbook,

from the magazines for men.

If you should mess it up, you’ll start again.

But, still, they only want

the women

they condemn.

I think that I’d have too much fun in hell.

With the pagans

and the hedonists

and sapphics there as well.

Purgatory seems the better fit

I can’t stand waiting in the corner,

but I do love being hit.

There’s not a torture you can prescribe

that I wouldn’t find

a way to like.

Every single second I’m alive

I’m sharpening an axe I’d like to grind.

“I was sent to punish you

for the way I was designed.

You will never know a love

that you fear more than mine.”

- “God Fear a Woman” 2023

[tiredandlonelymuse]

Hello. Hi. I know you want new music.

I want you to know that I am hard at work. There were some restrictions I was under, for a lot longer than it seemed, but they are no longer in the way. I’m sure you can fill in the blanks.

I’m always writing aimlessly and lawlessly as you know. But “album mode” is a whole other arena and the games are just beginning. I am working on some of my favorite stuff I’ve ever conjured. Wild to think that it hasn’t even been 2 years since IICHLIWP! I know it feels like so much longer. It does to me too. But there were 2 years and 7 months between HFK and Manic and honestly I think it was worth it. The time I took. And the growth that got me from that album to the next.

Thank you for having the patience and the faith.

It will pay off in the long run.

This feels like my debut all over again, in some ways.

Your love and support have carried me through a time where I thought maybe I only had a few albums left in me, but I know now that there are so many more than I could have ever dreamed.

Anyways, I love you.

Down the rabbit hole I go 🕳️

See you soon.

[tiredandlonelymuse]

Perhaps it victimizes me to admit that I am expertly betrayed. Easily taken advantage of. I am not a martyr. I am The Devil’s Professional Advocate. I will put myself in your shoes till my flesh melts with the soles. And in these trappings not made for me, my clumsy and stumbling gait walks me into gaping pits of disillusion. Bear traps set in a forest by those who know I will stop to admire the leaves and search for beetles on their backs who need rescuing. I suppose that I owe my survival to a magic trick I learned (earned?) when I was young:

“Leave your body, and go somewhere else.”

I became such a skilled dis-associator that I split in two. Peel myself straight down the middle like the plastic backing of a bandaid. Astral project into a timeline where I haven’t made whatever grave error in character judgement has landed me in my terrible predicament. I have been asked 100 times what the difference is between Halsey and Ashley and I have never answered honestly. The truth is that I built her, as a child, to protect the tender core that lies beneath. In a confusing chain of events, my maladaptive daydream became my full time reality. My armor can walk and talk and they look just like me. But you can’t hurt us anymore,

Because one of us is not real.

[tiredandlonelymuse]

I wish that I was better, for the kids who emulate.

but they should really all know better,

than to take the fucking bait

that I’ve been dangling from this building

with my goosebumps in the cold.

I am nothing but a story for a man until I’m sold.

and he can tell it in the lobby, to the old men at the bar

they’ll all clink his cup

and make shit up.

to take it all too far,

they’ll tell a lie about the summer

where they “once had me alone”

and I’ll reside inside a sonnet.

I’m a picture in a phone.

I’ve aged beyond the angel they all saw inside me then.

a grotesque and fading memory

trapped underneath a pen.

“MPDG” 2023

[latemorninglullaby-deactivated2]

[metamorphesque]

“I long to see you, hear your voice, My narcissistic object-choice.”

— Wendy Cope, As Sweet

[tiredandlonelymuse]

Halsey, i love you 💕🥰

My first question in my inbox and it’s not a question it’s an adorable proclamation! I love you right back.

[tiredandlonelymuse]

what made you decide to come back to tumblr?

I miss talking to you guys and sharing things in a space that doesn’t have such potential to turn into tabloid-fare. Here I can write a poem about being a terrible evil murderous vampire, and people will be like “oh cool!”. On other platforms that would end up conspiracy or a psychological evaluation lol.

[tiredandlonelymuse]

When did you know you were going to make a career out of being creative?

I guess it just sort of happened. I didn’t really know what I was signing up for, I thought it would be the cheat code to life; do the thing you love and survive off of it. But at this point there’s not a single passion of mine that hasn’t been monetized or exploited in some way and when art starts having input and rules and perimeters it gets complicated. I would still choose this over any other type of livelihood any day. But the tough parts come when you make something you want to share and it immediately becomes part of the “brand” or the “narrative”. Very high stakes for every little creation because they all color the vast scope of how you are perceived as an artist. Even little things I post on here. To answer your question, I guess I’m still not sure about making a career out of being a creative! Haha. But if I didn’t, it would try to consume and eat every part and hour of my day anyway. At least this way I get to use it for something good. Plus the greatest part, having been on both sides of it as an artist, is that with this growth comes a whole new world of resources and opportunities. Every time I walk into a huge set I designed, or work with a hero producer of mine, I am reminded of the times I walked into an art store and looked at the expensive canvases and though “Wow the things I could make if I only had access to the tools.” It teaches me to never take for granted having the tools, because I remember what it was like to window-shop through it. I guess that was when I decided. When I knew I had to sell art so that I could make money to make more and better art. It all goes back into the pot and the next thing evolves. That’s sorta the best way to do it.

[tiredandlonelymuse]

do you have a concept for your next album/era already?

yes :)

[tiredandlonelymuse]

If you were able to re-record any song from your discography in a new musical style, which one would you pick?

Girl is a Gun as the biggest pop smash ever.

or Drive as an 80s new wave banger haha.

[tiredandlonelymuse]

Any mediums that you would not be interested in creating through?

I am actually a terrible photographer. I can draw a picture of something and it will look more like it’s reference than if I try to take a damn photo of it. Haha. I like editing / coloring / directing etc. Setting up a shot, curating an image, and getting the tonal ambience right in post. But if I’m the one to click the shutter for some reason everything immediately becomes SHIT!