The Weeknd Continues to Transcend Genre With ‘Starboy’
Jeff Moses
With the release of his newest record, “Starboy,” The Weeknd is serving notice that he plays a huge role in the future of popular music. Using similar melodies without an overabundance of features, the falsetto troubadour’s third album emulates the style of one of his heroes, Michael Jackson. Though, the Canadian-born popstar does brings along heavy hitters on this turn in the spotlight, too.
Preceding his highly-anticipated record, the reclusive singer took another page out of the King of Pop’s playbook and released a short film showing off some of the album’s themes and highlights. The twelve minute teaser, “Mania,” hit the internet on Nov. 23 and has already amassed more than 6.5 million views on YouTube.
“Starboy” opens and closes with Daft Punk, first on the title track and then on “Feel It Coming.” Also guesting on The Weeknd’s most pop-sounding release to date are singer Lana Del Rey on “Stargirl Interlude” and hip-hop heavyweights Future and Kendrick Lamar on “Sidewalks” and “All I Know,” respectively.
“False Alarm,” the album’s third track, displays a sense of urgency, taking on a much faster pace than the other songs on the album. While the music video is a point-of-view action thriller comparable to the likes of Prodigy’s “Smack My Bitch Up.”
The Weeknd also uses the bully pulpit of his new album to reflect upon who he is and where he is at now. The hardest-hitting lyrics on the album come on the record’s fourth track “Reminder.” Here, the festival headliner fights against his mass appeal, reminding the public that he may be have adopted a pop sound, but his darker drug and sex tropes take him far from mainstream boy-bandish territory. “Goddamn bitch I am not a teen choice, god damn bitch I am not a beach boy.”
The lyrics on “Reminder” and the rest of the record are delivered with a distinctly hip-hop cadence that calls back to previous R&B / hip-hop blenders such as R. Kelly, another artist that’s a big influence on The Weeknd’s music. The Weeknd may borrow from Jackson and Kelly, but still he builds his own experimental sound on top of what he’s heard them do in their gloried pasts.
Calling The Weeknd an R&B singer does not do him justice; his music is as much a unique blend of dark R&B as it is hip-hop and pop. With “Starboy,” The Weeknd further clarifies that he can not be pigeonholed by the concept of genre.
“Starboy” is available on Apple Music Nov. 25. More information on The Weeknd’s “Starboy: Legend of the Fall Tour” can be found here.