The figure of the hellhound enters the realm of pop via a 1937 recording by Robert Johnson. Within the strict confines of “Hellhound on My Trail” it is a potently ambiguous symbol, evoking not only impending doom and the wages of sin but also whatever self-destructive compulsion invited that doom in the first place. By its nature, though, pop does not limit itself to strict confines, and what Johnson’s hellhound evokes outside the song is specific and clear: the legend that the bluesman struck a deal with Satan for his mastery of the guitar. This sinister myth succeeded so completely as to rearrange every other scant biographical detail; today, even people who know little else about the blues know that Johnson sold his soul to play like no one who came before him. Scholars who have attempted to trace the devil story’s origins find it sufficiently widespread among Johnson’s surviving acquaintances to conclude that he very likely told it about himself.

The hellhound—with all the concerns it signals about deals and debts and mythmaking—reappears in “I Blame Myself,” a recent single from the debut album by twenty-one-year-old singer, songwriter, actress, and model Sky Ferreira. Despite her relative youth, Ferreira has long been fidgeting in the metaphorical green room of pop stardom: she began her recording career in her early teens, spurred by an active online presence and a family connection to Michael Jackson. Her first singles positioned her as a synth-pop act with a strong alto voice and a gift for anthemic shout-alongs. After those initial efforts failed to hit big, label support faltered, and her album was repeatedly announced, delayed, scrapped, and begun anew with a host of prominent collaborators. Two EPs released in the meantime suggested an artist ill at ease with how she’d been branded, and who had broader and darker tastes than her early output indicated. Night Time, My Time finally emerged in 2013 as an urgent, sullen, troublesome thing, a harsh panoply of post-punk and industrial textures bolted to a sturdy pop frame. Among the many traces of its difficult birth, none is more conspicuous than “I Blame Myself.”

Almost all pop songs work by couching their sentiments in general terms and avoiding narrative and biographical particulars, encouraging the audience to identify with the singer’s ostensible circumstances. This one doesn’t. “Is it because you know my name,” go the opening lines, “or is it because...