Written by: Alec Swan
Tesfaye (The Weeknd) has had an amazing year so far. With him having a small role in the film Uncut Gems, to having huge success with his single "Blinding Lights" and now with the full album released, reviews and reception from his fans couldn’t have been better. Before After Hours, I never listened to much of The Weeknd except for some of his top singles like "Star Boy" and "The Hills." This new album really resonated with me.
In this blog, I want to highlight how the film Uncut Gems inspired the sound of this album, my favorite tracks, and the success of "Blinding Lights."
Uncut Gems
Uncut Gems was a film released in 2019 which portrayed a gritty look at what addiction can do to someone’s life. Tesfaye played a small role in this film and worked with Daniel Lopatin who did the original score for the film and worked on "Repeat After Me (Interlude)," "Until I Bleed Out," and had writing credits on "Scared To Live." The score of Uncut Gems uses tons of synthesized and psychedelic melodies to drive the film forward. You can definitely hear the similarities of style in songs from the album such as "Hardest To Love" and "Blinding Lights."
I Lost My Faith
Let’s talk about some of the amazing tracks on this Album. One of my personal favorite songs would have to be "Faith." This song really speaks to me because when I was a kid, I would go to church a decent amount, but as I have gotten older, I have lost that. I also feel like I have lost faith in certain friends and even myself a few times over these last few years. Also, the ENDING! I love how the song ends. The sound starts to fade out and we hear the words “I ended up in the back of a flashing car,” the song eventually ends, and the next track is blinding lights. I think this is a fantastic transition and definitely the biggest hit of the album.
Social Media
If you have been on social media or TikTok this year, you have probably seen people doing a specific dance routine to the song "Blinding Lights." "Blinding Lights" currently has over 700 million listens on Spotify and has become the defining song of the album. I think what TikTok is doing for specific songs is really interesting. These dance routines are blowing up and are really exposing songs that are big or small so that everyone can get involved with them. Similar to what is going on with Drake's "Tootsie Slide". It will be interesting going forward to see more songs with a specific dance routine or TikTok in mind.
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