Halsey Return to Badlands - Sold Out at the Aragon Ballroom

This year's theme is definitely profiting off of a time that we are mourning, but unfortunately will never get back...for one night though, we could at least pretend.

We meticulously glued colorful gems to our faces and embraced the fashions we all know and love and subsequently haven't let go off in the past decade...

Halsey's Return to Badlands is an homage to a decade of successful Tumblr girl-esque behavior. Badlands did not only influence the masses of early twenty somethings back in the day, but it got us through some rough times as we were all simultaneously navigating the vast and deep sea of adulthood unknowns, heartbreaks, traumas, and figuring out who we are as people. The album raised a generation of young women and was a huge staple in the queer community as well molding our formative years of adulthood. Suddenly it seemed as though the struggles we were all enduring felt mutual...somehow easier to digest.

Earlier this year, Halsey embarked on a tour entitled "For My Last Trick..." which was meant to promote her conceptual album "The Great Impersonator" and upon hearing that news, having been a devoted Halsey fan and knowing she had been struggling with her health behind the scenes, I was vehemently convinced that this indeed would have been her last tour. Consumed with grief and sadness, I turned to Badlands and then...Badlands revived a tour of its own.

Pardon, miss m'am?

The highly anticipated tour deserved its own moment in the sun. Chicago's first night November 8th, 2025 sold out and was filled to the brim with fans old and new. Upon coming on stage, Halsey herself could not believe the different age ranges. Retrospectively for Halsey, this album was a major homecoming and being able to sing and perform these tracks ten years later possessed a deeper meaning. In between interacting with the audience, she herself has admitted that she's "so much better at performing them now".

It was emotional, it was raw, it was energetic...Halsey performed the entire Badlands album, throwing in tracks from both "The Great Impersonator", "Manic" and of course the very underrated "If I Can't Have Love, I Want Power" which was an alternative grunge album in collaboration with Nine Inch Nails.

This show, however, leaned heavily into the monochromatic "Alice in Wonderland" theme and down the rabbit hole we went; some audience members recalling experiencing an out-of-body ethereal experience during the performances of "Bells in Santa Fe" and "People Disappear Here"

The visuals were each telling a story featuring intimate moments, coquettish and flirtatious adaptations of Halsey's persona, almost imitating a burlesque essence about it, but all I could attribute it to was a futuristic Tokyo billboard. Perhaps it was the 1920s spirit of the ballroom or the overall quintessential reception of the sold out crowd, but even Halsey herself has acknowledged that crowd work was not something she would need to worry about tonight. Chicago knew the lyric to every single song that was performed and Halsey's performance embraced the reciprocation of the crowd; putting in emotional depth into every note and decibel, demonstrating her vocal range and pushing the boundaries...she even teased an unreleased track dedicated specifically to Chicago. Is she going to put it out? Let's hope so and let's continue to be the city where every artist is hoping to come back to, fueling them with the energy and inspiration that this city fills us with every single day.

The setlist consisted of a balance of new material, fan favorites and tracks that grew with Halsey showcasing her broad and eclectic growth as an artist.

BADLANDS TV took us on a trip down memory lane we will not forget. We all belt out into song for beloved ballads like "Gasoline" "Castle" "Control" "Coming Down" "Strange Love" "Haunting" "New Americana" "Hurricane" "Hold Me Down" "Garden" and ultimately the track that changed the trajectory of.the artist's life "Ghost"

"Ghost" was a song that Halsey posted on her SoundCloud back in February of 2014. She was kicked out of her home, given an ultimatum between pursuing school vs music, but clearly the universe recognized that a vocal talent like such could not go to waste. The song garnered such a buzz overnight that it catapulted Halsey towards opportunities that allowed her to speak her mind through albums in other forms.

According to Halsey, Ghost is meant to tell the story of "being in a relationship with someone who isn't emotionally available; you feel their physical presence, but the emotional one isn't there."

So, like, every single guy in the city of Chicago...we all know at least one or two.

We experienced a rock version of "Coming Down" and a stripped down version of "Garden" which was intercepted by my absolute favorite interlude "Colors pt II" and a gem from The Great Impersonator: "Lonely is the Muse"

The concept of the show wasn't meant to be a cheesy retrospective tale, but rather an invitation to decide the course of the show; during the encore, the audience had a choice in deciding which songs they would like to hear and night one consisted of "Devil in Me" over its counterpart "Bad at Love"

You can relive the show by tuning into the setlist on the live recorded performance below: