On the 18th of September, the world of pop music was rocked by the launch of Ava Max’s first album, “Heaven & Hell”. The 26-year-old singer-songwriter, who had her name thrown into the spotlight in 2018 with the song “Sweet but Psycho”, released an album that unites well-known songs she’s already launched with some new productions that promise to be a big success.
The concept of the album is a discussion about the dualities of the challenges we face every day. “Some songs have darkness; other songs are more positive. “Heaven & Hell” is the middle ground”, she said in a statement. This concept is shown even in the structure of it, that is divided in two blocks. Both blocks have dancing songs, but with different auras on their lyrics.
The block “Heaven” brings more positive songs, with a lot of confidence in its lyrics and “Hell” talks about insecurities and even brings some polemic songs. That’s the case for the most popular song from the artist, “Sweet but Psycho”, that was very criticized because people affirmed that she was treating a psychological disturbance in a problematic way. When asked about this, she affirmed that the song wasn’t written about that , but about the way some guys portray women when they don’t act like they are expected to or when they are more intense. She said that she was trying to bring up the question of “gaslighting”, a kind of psychological abuse in which the aggressor distorts the situations selectively to manipulate the victim and make their self-esteem decrease till the point it’s annulled.
If we look from this point of view, we can understand why the song “Salt” is in this block of the album. The song is about getting over a relationship and starting to go out again, about being herself again, as she is set free. But it also addresses all the challenges and relapses that happen during this period.
The musicality and the idea of the album are very good, the songs all have high quality, the only low point is that the songs have a very similar beat, they don’t vary too much. Other than that, we highly recommend that you listen to “Heaven & Hell”!
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The article above was edited by Laura Okida.
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