The Weeknd: The Evolution of a Toxic Lover | Video Essay

through the 2010s i don't think there's been an artist as mysterious and misunderstood as abel tesfaye otherwise known as the weeknd his music has always been defined by a reluctance towards intimacy it reflects many men's hesitation about being truly vulnerable as well as how this internal struggle can manifest in toxic ways he's made a career putting into words the unsavory aspects of relationships that aren't quite as glamorous as the love ballads we've grown accustomed to and for many people his music embodies the intense bitter feelings of heartbreak this along with themes of death shown in several of his music videos where he's often violently killed gave his music a visceral quality and as his music evolved and his career blossomed his artistry expanded into bigger spectacles that included elaborate pieces of performance art but he's mostly maintained this cold and often depressing take on intimacy even as the songs top the pop charts so in this video i want to break down how the weeknd creatively explores the disconnect between intimacy and honesty fame and happiness and short-lived success and inevitable death [Music] ladies and gentlemen the weekend when i first started listening to the weekend in 2011 like most of us i had no idea who he was or what he even looked like he was such a mysterious figure that no one knew if he was a solo singer or a band at first the vocalist in this group can really really sing and if you notice throughout this video i'll mostly be reading his quotes because he's very rarely given video interviews i try to shy away from press because it's it's never about the art for them i think his initial anonymity spoke to how rapid and seemingly overnight his success was he described his early days in a gq article noting nobody knew what i looked like i was not popping i was struggling at the time i was folding clothes at american apparel when somebody at the store played the song mind you nobody knew who the weekend was i think we went on for about like almost a year with no pictures everyone's like who is this guy who's the weeknd how does he look and he welcomed the anonymity the chance to get a quote unbiased reaction and the genre he felt was heavily influenced by artist appearance but through the mystery what made us so curious about him was his dark take on the typical conventions of the r b genre [Music] he approached it with moral ambiguity highlighted by painfully blunt lyrics it's most evident in his first notable single wicked games [Music] the brooding guitar strums on the song provide a sinister undertone to a story of lust and deceit rather than depicting sex as a means of expressing love or affection he describes it almost like a deal with the devil where he bears his vulnerabilities and indignities in exchange for a fleeting moment of empty passion it's something many of us can relate to in the sense we often use physical closeness to compensate for emotional detachment to get the satisfaction of external companionship without having to do the work of connecting on an internal emotional level [Music] the song reminds me of the classic michael jackson song dirty diana while the weeknd has actually covered the track i think wicked games best reflects dirty diana's influence on him unlike michael's other well-known hits dirty diana's a little more aggressive than songs like billie jean or thriller as it's about getting seduced by groupies while on tour [Music] it's not a romantic or bouncy song to dance to but instead a messy tale about shameful affairs on the road the early portion of abel's career seemed defined by similar cynicism there was a certain toxicity that permeated his mixtapes and debut album he constantly sang about the murky insincere and often unpleasant aspects of relationships from cheating to maintaining the guise of a happy one in the midst of its decay [Applause] so it's no wonder when you listen to the opening track of his debut mixtape house of balloons it's an eerie introduction and almost a warning for the listener to be prepared for a bleak melancholic journey [Music] from his first mixtape to his first official album kissland he appeared to approach music from a place of self-loathing even when he's been heartbroken or wronged he doesn't paint himself as a sympathetic figure often he's admittedly cruel selfish and hurtful [Music] throughout this era he seemed almost ashamed of feeling close to someone like he didn't think he deserved to be cared for but at the same time didn't find anyone deserving of his time i think it's why in most of his songs he's pushing people away and often he does so with spectacular pettiness while we've heard countless songs about infidelity abel took them to new depths and songs like the knowing where he describes knowing of his partner's cheating but instead of simply ending things he gets petty revenge other than this gross means of payback what i found significant was his unwillingness to admit the pain he clearly felt like in the line you probably thought you break my heart you probably thought you'd make me cry but it's okay he doesn't wallow in his emotions but suppresses them refusing to give her the satisfaction of knowing she meant anything to him [Music] it helps me create a sort of melancholy r b and alternative soul music with very honest and disturbing truths what young men think but will never say out loud for abel intimacy is never as straightforward as two people falling in love but rather an entanglement characterized by insincerity and deceit which made him suspicious of the whole idea i get the sense he's disillusioned and refuses to shed his defenses with a woman because of the fear of getting hurt or rejected he elaborated in a 2013 complex interview where he said that's what kissland is to me an environment that's just honest fear i don't know who i am right now and i'm doing all these outlandish things in these settings that i'm not familiar with kissland is like a horror movie [Music] following kissland the weeknd's popularity soared to new heights as he found himself atop the charts alongside the taylor swifts and justin bieber's of the world he's still saying about the messy aspects of love but now it sounded more refined and crisp in beauty behind the madness he dropped some of the ethereal elements in favor of a more bombastic and catchy production specifically his collaboration with ariana grande on love me harder opened the doors to the upper echelon of pop stardom introducing him to max martin the producer behind 25 number one singles together they created two chart-topping hits but most notably they tapped into abel's vocal resemblance to michael jackson with can't feel my face which i felt channeled michael's don't stop till you get enough [Music] the funk inspired song was a new step in abel's evolution as it proved he could achieve mainstream success without compromising his artistic integrity while martin typically spearheads the creative direction of songs he produces abel insisted on writing his own lyrics for can't feel my face even with his jumpy baseline he doesn't resort to singing about simply dancing in the club instead the song likens the sensation of drug addiction to that of the love of a woman and i know she'll be the death of me at least yeah i can't feel my face definitely made me nervous because it was such a um it was so separate from what i'm used to it's a huge defiant part it was a risk but you know doing songs like earned it and love me harder definitely um i think love me harder was even more nervous yeah yeah yeah yeah so doing that it kind of i was kind of sending a message and kind of easing into the camping of my face but i think his most compelling single from beauty behind the madness was the hills [Applause] in it he describes a hidden love affair but instead of painting it as a story of unrequited love he harshly maintains his distance and confirms he only cares about the sexual satisfaction his partner provides the cold and piercing beat compliments the message he tells his partner which is simply i don't care about you it's dispassionate and straight up mean as he admits he only wants it for her body even though the sound of his music was changing the themes didn't really change throughout beauty behind the madness he upholds this image of a fuckboy bragging about his sexual exploits and songs like tell your friends and often specifically and often there's an interesting dichotomy between the song's lyrics and its sample [Music] as it derives from a turkish song translating to each day goes on for years i'm tired of going alone meanwhile abel's lyrics depict a lifestyle where he's perpetually surrounded by women and drugs i think it reveals an inconvenient truth about abel's music that gets further explored later in his career which we'll get into in a bit anyway i think his characterization as basically a scumbag made him one of the most interesting personas in music and consequently led to his newfound success as a pop singer through sheer dedication to making his art he created a distinct image suddenly hollywood elites were his peers he was dating supermodels and pop singers and his music reflected a new lifestyle while his rising popularity was intentional in the sense he aimed to achieve commercial success it was still shocking even to him to see just how popular he'd become in his interview with gq he mentioned seeing tom cruise lip-syncing his song on tv saying when he did that that moment was crazy just because he's not a real person he's a figment of my childhood this era of his career seemed to consistently highlight the surreal nature of his newfound elevated status and fame he was accumulating number one hits performing on world tours and featuring on blockbuster movie soundtracks even if he kept some of his original mystique he wasn't an unknown anymore he was mainstream so much so it seemed like he couldn't make a song that wasn't a hit it was clear he wasn't just that kid from toronto anymore [Music] on his next album starboy he had a more electronic sound that pushed his music further from the brooding aesthetic he was known for much to the dismay of some of his die-hard fans who felt attached to his original sound for abel i think it was a move to separate himself from any specific identity he might have cultivated and also why he ultimately cut his trademark hair weekend update i got a haircut he elaborated on his change in hairstyle in a wall street journal interview saying it didn't feel right anymore because it ended up becoming a trademark i told everybody i was getting rid of it and everybody literally unanimously they were like no don't do it that's your whole thing that's you and the way they said that i was like oh i'm definitely cutting it now he didn't want to be boxed into any distinct sound genre or even look so on starboy i think he used it as an opportunity to experiment and explore new aspects of his creativity he later admitted the album was somewhat purposefully sporadic representing an eclectic collage of themes sounds and ideas even as he collaborated with daft punk he was influenced by braggadocio rappers of the 2000s who all seem to be making i made it rags to riches stories homelessness these [ __ ] who is the star boy like what is the character and what makes up the character starboy is the next chapter in this this chronicle this this saga my fans call it you know they call it in chapters you know he's a cool dope character that um you know makes an appearance a lot on the album more like braggadocious kind of character that we all kind of have inside of us so this is your way of being able to express yourself with success pretty much but notably the album also contains songs that were surprisingly vulnerable in a way his music wasn't before songs like die for you and true colors still come from a place of mistrust but ultimately relinquish the barriers he typically held in his music it feels like one of the few moments he allows himself to be emotionally intimate even as his instincts tell him not afford love to pull us apart [Music] i think the surrender of emotion directly led to the subsequent ep my dear melancholy it came to be after the dissolution of some of his real-life relationships with famous partners and in a moment of pain he briefly returned to his old aesthetic when asked about the ep in his gq interview he said i used it as therapy i made it in like three weeks i knew exactly what i wanted to say i knew how i wanted it to sound and that was it and then i performed it at coachella and boy was that therapeutic because i was hearing people scream and sing along to call out my name just me and my guitar the song reminds me of the temptations classic ain't too proud to beg in the sense it's a take me back song [Music] but while ain't too proud to beg is a feel-good jam that sounds perfect over the end of a romantic comedy as two characters reconcile call out my name somber beat makes it feel like a much more bitter and desperate plea to stay together it's a song meant for the playlist you listen to as you wallow alone in your bedroom thinking about your ex wondering what could have been in the song he begrudgingly admits to being hurt despite his urge to feign indifference [Music] i think it shows why he and honestly many of us feel the impulse to distance ourselves from our partners he's afraid of developing a connection and ultimately losing it left to pick up the pieces in a pool of his sorrows my dear melancholy was a bit of a return to who he used to be it was dark and atmospheric in a way that reminded fans of his early work but moving forward i think he came to a realization while trying to rekindle the essence of who he used to be whether he could help it or not he discovered he'd become someone else entirely you belong to them not the other way around [Music] after my dear melancholy it seemed like the weekend was transitioning into a new phase of his career his albums were growing more grandiose and conceptual culminating in the release of after hours with the song heartless a sleek and extravagantly produced track by metro boomin the weekend debuted a noticeably different appearance showcasing a new haircut facial hair in a distinct red suit it proved to be more than a one-off wardrobe choice as he donned the same look for all of his public appearances it slowly became clear he was performing as a character separate from himself it wasn't necessarily a new endeavor for him as he'd made a short film for starboy called mania and even hinted at portraying an alter ego but after hours was the most ambitious and interconnected work he'd ever created i think the visuals aren't discussed enough as he clearly put a lot of thought and detail into his public performances and i would argue he deliberately set out to make performance art spanning multiple mediums like music videos short films and live performances he weaves a loose narrative through the entire album with tons of notable references to classic films beginning with heartless we see a character simply known as the character get lost in the glitz and glam of las vegas he goes through an out of control night filled with partying and drugs before wandering off seemingly trying to escape the city of sin [Music] the story takes a turn after his performance on jimmy kimmel live he walks away from the raucous crowd and roams around alone faced with the emptiness he was trying to fill clearly exhausted and drained as a smile fades and his expression becomes more and more distorted trying to express his inner turmoil but when he puts on the sunglasses it's as though he gets possessed dragged around until we ultimately see him in a closing elevator in this demonic state he terrorizes a woman in a manner reminiscent of classic slasher films until she eventually decapitates him and returns to the dance club with the severed head later his head finds his way onto the street of an affluent neighborhood where it's found by two heavily bandaged women is that who i think it is they desecrate his head before attaching it to another man's body apparently bringing him back to life since he later appears at the 2020 amas heavily bruised bandaged and bloody the story ends in regret in the videos for till i bleed out and snow child wishing he could escape the life he built the life he dreamt of he reminisces on all he went through homelessness his rise to fame and recognizes he had little choice but to be seduced by the industry all the fame and success took him away from poverty but it also brought different forms of hardship a life where he could no longer just be himself but had to be the weeknd finally in the music video for savior tears it seems to me he's performing the song years from now in front of a small anonymous audience and barely recognizable due to botched plastic surgeries [Music] he's propped up on stage performing for the masked and unresponsive audience until he pulls out a gun to shoot himself only for confetti to shower out as he smiles for the cheering crowd so that was a lot to unpack able left the meaning behind this elaborate performance ambiguous to allow overly dedicated fans like myself to find our own meanings honestly i just i have my answers but i love people's theories and conclusions on who he is and what it means and the message he's giving i think it speaks to abel's journey with fame the lifestyle traps him and refuses to let him go until he transforms into another plastic soulless celebrity he later explained saying the significance of the entire head bandages is reflecting on the absurd culture of hollywood celebrity and people manipulating themselves for superficial reasons to please and be validated in his search to gain validation he becomes someone else entirely his startling appearance by the end of the saga could be a reference to michael jackson as mj has been an inspiration and frequent comparison to the weekend his whole career looking at what the music industry did to him milking him for decades of entertainment ruining his life through endless paparazzi and tabloid fodder releasing albums after his death and reanimating him for posthumous live performances i think it speaks to the parasitic nature of fame people clamor for them to give pieces of themselves until there's nothing left to give because of their similarities abel uses his performance art to question if he's destined for the same tragic fate the album's rollout was one of the most extensive and ambitious endeavors we'd ever seen and it paid off amassing multiple number one hits a super bowl halftime performance and somehow zero grammy nominations y'all are dumb oh my god corny lame boo tomato tomato tomato thrown tomatoes but the grand narrative and ambitious strain of performances only mask what he expresses through the lyrics which is a deep sense of nostalgia for his past life and yearning for lost love the music on after hours is intoxicating as it combines 80 cents with pulsating bass lines creating a feeling of an uncontrollable and disorienting trip into the heart of sin cities [Music] just as he kept a front in the early portion of his career the performance art obscured the sense of loneliness he felt after finally giving himself to a relationship only for it to crumble in an interview with variety he said you can see there's a sadness to it i'm obviously telling a story in the singles but the bigger story is this album underneath the extravagance of after hours he's reeling from a relationship that left him broken embarrassed and isolated the drugs the parties and the excess are all distractions for his looming sense of loneliness [Music] it's a reflection of how he felt meeting a woman who treated him the way he's treated women his whole life as catalogued in his music the nonchalant disinterested attitude he gave to countless women was thrown back to him and he saw how painful it felt to be on the other side [Music] he hit his emotional low and was lost in the dark waiting for the night to fade to dawn you are now listening to 103.5 don fm you've been in the dark for way too long featuring incredible dance grooves and bouncing synths the weeknd's next album dawn fm leaned further into a nostalgic 80s aesthetic it began with fast-paced tracks about living in the moment and not thinking about tomorrow [Music] it's thematically reminiscent of the music he made earlier in his career where he prioritized himself over the needs of his partners but the album isn't a return to those themes it's a re-analysis of them throughout dawn fm we're periodically visited by our dj in purgatory played by none other than jim carrey similar to vincent price's role and thriller darkness falls across the land the midnight tower is close at hand scared don't worry we'll be there to hold your hand and guide you through this painless transition here carrie's voice is an unnerving yet comforting presence guiding us to the end of our journey just relax and enjoy another hour of commercial free music it directly ties to the album cover and abel's new appearance as a great older version of himself contemplating his past mistakes re-examining who he was and how it led him to where he is today after a lifetime of keeping people at arm's length they've slowly started to move on from him leaving him plagued by regret and loneliness so its fitting don fm included an interlude from quincy jones the iconic producer behind three michael jackson albums that essentially defined the 80s his production clearly influenced don fm but his appearance lends to the overarching theme as he tells a traumatic childhood story watching my mother get put in a straight jacket and taken out of my home when i was only seven years old this along with this quote evil stepmother led to quincy's strained relationship with women that lasted his entire life whenever i got too close to the woman i would cut her off partially based on fear after the interlude abel's sense of regret permeates the rest of the album's lyrics reflecting his longing for better times that have passed him by and the intimate connections he squandered i think this is most evident in the progression between best friends and is there someone else which i have to say contains a euphoric song transition [Music] in best friends he sings about a friends with benefit situation that ends because his partner caught feelings over a thumping bass synth he admits he has an affection for her but he's not willing to commit is there someone else his demeanor shifts to brazen jealousy about his partner being with anyone else it's a stark contrast from his rejection of her feelings on the previous track revealing how he mask his true longing for intimacy through a veil of indifference and it's only further solidified in tracks like don't break my heart and i heard you're married now that she's found someone else to spend her time with he's confronted by feelings of inadequacy and realizes he's wasted his time pushing people away [Music] by the album's conclusion we're once again visited by jim heaven's for those who let go of request [Music] you have to wait here when you're not all there yet he tells us about the existential burden of regret and how it holds his back just as a spirit in purgatory is trapped because it can't move on to the afterlife abel still can't move on from the one that got away was it often a dissonant chord you were strumming were you ever in tune with the song life was humming nevertheless jim's words laced with a hint of impending death feel strangely reassuring offering a lesson in letting go after years of embracing his worst instincts being toxic and spiteful abel ends the album on a surprisingly uncynical note in a show of remorse for his old ways and newfound maturity [Music] at the time of making this video it doesn't seem like abel's finished telling the visual story of don fm so far we've seen him violently beat down his older self as if literally fighting off old age only for this older version of him to continue haunting him with his now disfigured face stalking him everywhere he goes in his latest video for out of time it ends with him beginning the process of a face transplant possibly hinting at the feudal nature of trying to fix the problems of the past i haven't quite pinpointed where the story is going so if anybody has any theories let me know what you think he's hinted that dawn fm is part of a new trilogy forum whether it's the first second or third chapter isn't so clear but it is clear he's been creating a greater interconnected story through his music and while he seems to assume the persona of someone else through his performance art i think it's indicative of his growth into a more mature and reflective person for some of his longtime fans it might feel like he's not the same sinister shadowy artist we first discovered all those years ago and he isn't just like his music he's constantly evolving and finding new and captivating ways to tell stories whether they're brutally honest lyrics or complex performance art i don't know what will come after dawn but i'm looking forward to whatever he has in store [Music] hey guys thanks for watching i honestly can't decide which weekend album is the best i'm still down to fight you on the comments about it also if you have any ideas on who i should do a video on next let me know until then i'll see y'all next time peace

Channel: Quality Culture

Views: 1,897,322

Keywords: weeknd, the weeknd analysis, the weeknd breakdown, the weeknd review, the weeknd music review, the weekend analysis, the weekend singer, the weekend music breakdown, the weeknd after hours, the weeknd dawn fm, the weeknd starboy, the weeknd house of balloons, the weeknd kissland, the weeknd dawn fm review, abel tesfaye analysis, abel tesfaye review, the weeknd video essay

Id: Wng60I_a8h4

Length: 26min 47sec (1607 seconds)

Published: Thu Apr 14 2022