Demi Lovato – “Skyscraper”

Ladies and ladyboys, break out the handkerchiefs–’cause you’re about to bawl.

“Skyscraper” is the devastatingly beautiful lead single from Demi Lovato‘s third studio album, tentatively due out later this year.

Starting off atop a simple piano melody, Lovato slowly but steadily croons her way though this utterly chilling all-or-nothing endurance anthem, produced by Toby Gad and co-penned by Estonian pop star, Kerli.

As the song continues, the young singer’s trembling, jagged vocals climb across an increasingly loud landscape of crashing drum beats and soaring strings. “You can take everything I have, you can break everything I am / Like I’m made of glass, like I’m made of paper,” she cries out. “I will be rising from the ground / Like a skyscraper.”

Although the song’s haunting melodies are already wrought with emotion, it’s the quiet acknowledgement of Lovato’s not-so-private struggle with her own inner demons lying just underneath the surface of “Skyscraper” that provides the song with an extra kick in the gut and an added lump in the throat.

Somewhere between the song’s defiant bridge and final howled chorus, you come to understand that this is more than simply run-of-the-mill pop balladry, and that the quivering vocals carrying this song are a clue that this is hitting very, very close to home.

“Skyscraper” was released on July 13. (iTunes)