Halseys creatively expansive new album channels Bruce Springsteen as inspiration for one of her most personal songs.

“Letter to God (1983), the eighth track on her new LP ‘The Great Impersonator,’ interpolates the haunting keyboards of Springsteen’s 1984 hit, ‘I’m On Fire.'” Halsey also mimics his vocal style, but the rhythmic tempo is somewhat faster.

Although the subject matter differs between songs, the use of the keyboard creates a familiar sense of longing. In “I’m On Fire,” Springsteen sings from the perspective of a man longing for a married woman. Meanwhile, on “Letter to God (1983),” a follow-up to another track on the album, “Letter to God (1974),” offers a cause and effect in both recording style and subject matter.

Halsey, who was born Ashley Frangipane in Edison and grew up mostly in Warren County, graduating from Warren Hills Regional High School in 2012, released her fifth studio album, “The Great Impersonator,” on Friday. The album was recorded between 2022 and 2024 while Halsey struck lupus and T-cell disorder diagnose and give birth to her son Ender.

Halsey, 30, had a very smart idea about the marketing style for this album. Eighteen days before the album’s release, she posted a series of side-by-side portraits of herself mimicking the album covers of the artists who inspired the production of the corresponding tracks.

For Bruce, she went full “Born in the USA”, with the blue jeans, hairstyle and identical pose.

But don’t let the ‘Impersonator’ aesthetic fool you – there’s a deep, dark introspection and personal stories woven throughout the new album.

“Letter to God (1974)” takes the approach of Halsey recording the song in a studio. The younger version of herself yearns for her mom and dad to be loving parents. She remembers a five-year-old boy diagnosed with leukemia and seeing the love and attention she craves for having another child. Halsey’s younger self begs for the disease to receive the same attention, unaware of the other consequences. The heartbreaking revelation comes four tracks later.

“Letter to God (1983)” takes the approach of an older Halsey performing to a live audience (for Jersey purposes, let’s imagine The Stone Pony). Here she recalls a past relationship with an ex-boyfriend with a drug addiction and now afflicted with the disease her younger self prayed for in the previous song. The lyrics “Please, God, I don’t wanna be sick” are reversed from the previous song, hoping that she was not somehow manifesting her current struggles with illness.

The new album is Halsey’s first in three years. She’s playing an album release show at the Brooklyn Paramount Friday night.

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Murjani Rawls can be reached at [email protected] and followed on Twitter at@MurjaniRawls.

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