The Weeknd is known for the characters he depicts in his songs and music videos alike. In one moment, he can be a toxic, sex-crazed heartthrob. In the next, he’ll coo about the highs and lows he experiences while on drugs. Over time, he broadened his songwriting to be more romantic, easily slotting into pop radio. Then, you get into his music videos, where he’ll don prosthetics or leave himself bloodied, a tease of the Toronto crooner’s pivot into acting.
But there’s one description The Weeknd made for his music you might not expect: schizophrenic. In a 2016 interview with Billboard, he mused over the variety of different sides he presents in his music. But the journalist argued that his album Starboy and the title track itself brought something new into the ether.
The singer born Abel Tesfaye agreed, describing the character portrayal in his music as “almost schizophrenic.” “The vibe just represents how I feel, what relationship I’m going through, what friendships I’m going through, the success in my life, the failures in my life. It is all just documentation. I’m not going to sit here and just sing about making love, even though my favorite artists, that’s all they sing about,” The Weeknd said.
The Weeknd Opens Up About His Creative Process Behind Characters in His Music
Initially, he used to embody his characters early on, looking at his music through the same lens as a movie director. Where previous albums had central themes, Starboy expanded the horizons. Each song was a little different in its themes, comparing the title track to the kind of classic bragging you’d hear in hip-hop.
“The vibe on ‘Starboy’ comes from that hip-hop culture of braggadocio,” The Weeknd said. “From Wu-Tang and 50 Cent, the kind of music I listened to as a kid. Bragging just sounds good, man. I was a teenager when I saw Scarface, and even though it was unbelievable, it’s kind of cool Tony Montana could survive all those gunshots and not feel them.”
Then, to complete his sense of feeling “schizophrenic”, he jumped around to different musical styles. Still, the goal was to embrace hip-hop and all the different ways that could sound and look.
“And there’s more than one way to do hip-hop culture,” The Weeknd added. “For the chorus of ‘Secrets,’ we used The Romantics’ ‘Talking in Your Sleep’ and ‘Pale Shelter’ by Tears for Fears. It’s like hip-hop: Just grab it. We could have done the interpolation thing, but sampling the original gets the feel.”
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