On March 31, Melanie Martinez released her album called PORTALS, 3 years after the album, K-12 (After School – Deluxe Edition). She proceedes to release the deluxe version, PORTALS (Deluxe) with the addition of 3 newer songs named POWDER, PLUTO, and MILK IF THE SIREN a couple days later. 

The album, PORTALS, is pretty well made and has a significant sense to Martinez. In her past house that she lived in for 6 years, she had a room called the “Portal” room. The reason why she called it that was because there was a lot of activity going on in that room rather than the outside of that room. She created 13 songs in that room, 6 which made it into the album. The base of the album revolved around the storyline of death to birth. 

Martinez starts the album with the song titled DEATH made in the portal room. She claims she heard a spirit sing the melody she had just sung which creeped her out, but continued to work hard with the help of some friends to release it. The line “I’m back from the dead”, has gone viral, but has a more meaningful denotation which is the experience of being dead, but still being existent to the lives of the living. She emphasizes that, “Portals’ screams death is life is death is life is death is life,” Martinez said. “A continuous loop. A circle.”

Another song that is pretty popular comes up second in the album named VOID, which was also produced and created in the portal room by herself. This song also has another line that is very popular that goes “I hate who I was before”. The meaning of VOID goes very deep as it goes for all her songs. “A void. A dark place where you are left alone with your own thoughts for introspection, in order to find the light within yourself,” Martinez said. 

Many fans state Melanie’s song titled MOON CYCLE is a response to mock Oliver Tree (Martinez’s ex-boyfriend), saying the line “Yah” and the mentioning of womens periods to mimic Olive Tree’s style of music during the song MOON CYCLE. Although the rest of Melanie’s songs are amazing, MOON CYCLE may be the worst in the album. Variety of fans don’t like how this song goes and that the mentioning of periods is cringey. Though this song may have a bit of shade towards Oliver Tree, Melanie still reveals a strong deep meaning to all her songs on the album.

The rest of Melanie’s songs were also very well written and had amazing choruses which a certain person can relate to. My personal favorites which you should listen to are EVIL, POWDER, and LIGHT SHOWER. If you like songs that are mellow and slow you possibly can like POWDER and LIGHT SHOWER. They both definitely have a sad feeling to them as you listen to them since they are slow. EVIL, on a different hand is more of an upbeat feeling as you listen to it. The beat for this song happens to be much harder than the other songs I’ve mentioned before. Although I recommended those three songs, I recommend you listen to all of her songs as you discover even more songs you may like. 

Overall, even though many people do not like her for the type of music she makes as it’s not a part of their own taste in music, to fans, Martinez’s new album has a very unique music style which fits in with the rest of her former songs, but leaves an ethereal/ relatable feeling as you listen to her. The album itself and the songs included leaves a collection of personal feelings where people can find comfort in her music. To fans and myself, this album was a great touch to Melanie Martinez’s music career since it fit her music style so well and wasn’t so over the top.