“Starboy” is a solid sign that The Weeknd, like Bowie, is pushing the boundaries of what we consider to be “popular”. The album’s title is a nod to David Bowie, who Tesfaye calls “the ultimate inventor”, and this reference is telling in terms of his aspirations. It’s a rare thing for an artist to be able to shape popular music, instead of being passively shaped by it (Tesfaye even managed to make his explicitness mainstream with “Earned It”, the single from the film 50 Shades of Grey). He’s cut his hair, broken up with Bella Hadid and has burst out into the mainstream, but Starboy is still The Weeknd doing what he does best. In an age where popular music has become increasingly bland in order to appeal to as many people as possible, his music is vividly honest - it’s not just about getting drunk in a club, it’s about the horrors of hedonism too, from come downs to regret to psychological turmoil. While the unique productions overlaid with eerie soulful vocal are of course a unifying thread, the narrative of Tesfaye’s grappling with success is at work throughout the hour long album. “Sidewalks” featuring Kendrick Lamar details Tesfaye’s rise to the top, from “homeless to Forbes list”, and is illustrative of Starboy’s credentials as a cohesive body of work. Pop music that truly speaks to people is a rare thing these days, but this album is so magnetising because it feels so distinctly personal. Where this kind of content would usually feel sleazy or sordid, The Weeknd manages to get away with it the lyrics feel like an uncompromisingly realistic reflection of his reality, and the aggressiveness is tempered by the smoothness of his sound. The worn out tropes of “b*tches and money” somehow feel subversive again, thanks to the experimental production and Tesfaye’s crooning vocal. Much of his subject matter used to be the reserve of rappers, and yet The Weeknd has now pioneered a kind of sub-genre of R&B that feels uncompromisingly authentic.
It's the kind of song you want to blast at full volume while driving a Bentley Mulsanne.
The track is a kind of confessional lament-cum-club banger, the potentially depressing lyrics are offset by the heavy sub bass line typical to the trap music that has dominated the American hip-hop scene recently. “All I Know”, featuring the rapper Future, is (another!) standout track that typifies The Weeknd’s ability to make seemingly polar pairings work. His smooth, soulful voice, which has so often been compared to that of Michael Jackson (who he continuously credits as a key influence and whose impact is unequivocally audible in “Rocking”), almost obscures the fact that, more often than not, he’s singing sexually explicit lyrics laden with references to drug use, with more than a small side of brooding desperation and nihilism. The Weeknd oscillates between pop-gloss and grit, between futility and meaning and between exposure and mystery. Tesfaye is one of the only hugely successful mainstream artists at the moment who isn’t conventionally cookie cutter, and it’s this dichotomy that characterises him as an artist.