okay. the weeknd. let’s tackle it. a musical act out of toronto (a band? one guy? i’m not even sure), they’ve been cosigned by drake and donald “childish gambino” glover as the hottest thing going right now. they just released a mixtape [which is actually just a recording of original music in this case. quit using the term mixtape for EVERYTHING - Grump Ed.] called house of balloons. it’s dark, moody R&B-based stuff - if you’re old enough to hear some 1999-era slow jam prince, you’re forgiven - with an alterna-indie slant. the alt slant is the nod to siouxsie & the banshees; the indie slant is the beach house sample. the lyrics are B-level rap quality: reliance on nigga and fuckin’, subject matter seemingly limited to doing drugs with hot girls in VIP then moving the party to a bitchin’ loft somewhere then having the sex then coming down from the drugs AND THE NEXT DAY WE DO IT ALL AGAIN. i think it’s what the young people will put on their phonographs when they entertain callers of the boot-knocking variety.
and i love this shit. lord help me, but i love it. it’s a groove i can stand behind. i feel like it’s what kanye was going for with his my beautiful dark work of staggering twisted genius. unfortunately, ‘ye has too much baggage; we don’t know anything about this dude (or dudes) so we’re intrigued. (also, no fergie or rihanna.) it’s just sad, sexy stuff.
last week i read this article on pitchfork. you should check it out, but if you don’t want to, it basically talks about falling for a (perceived) weaker version of a song/genre because it was introduced to you first. the beginning example given was i didn’t mean to turn you on, by either cherrelle or robert palmer, depending on the radio station you listened to at the time. (me? cherrelle.) the weeknd is offered as the latest example. i’m gonna cut & paste here, cuz i’m lazy:
The latest example: House of Balloons, the mixtape from a mysterious, Drake-approved, hyped-in-hip-circles Canadian project called the Weeknd. There aren’t really questions of appropriation here; the music scans as black R&B in intent and execution. But I’m pretty sure the first question a turned-off lover of mainstream R&B would ask certain Weeknd fans is, roughly: Why would you be more interested in this listless crap than, say, Jamie Foxx and Drake’s “Fall for Your Type”? Is it just because it samples Beach House and interpolates a Siouxsie & the Banshees track or because you hear about it in “hipper” spots than the Billboard charts?
word, word. i will totally cop to liking a song because someone/thing i thought was cool told me about it, even after brushing off the same news from a total square (in my eyes). i’ve gotten better about that - now i brush off everybody. i kid - i note the suggestions and get back to them later. but i will say this: there’s not much difference between the weeknd and that jamie foxx song. it’s the same kind of slow groove soaked in melancholy. see also a song i was slightly obsessed with some time ago, successful by drake & trey songz. i thought that was the saddest sounding braggadocious tune i’d ever heard on the radio.
my point? huh. not sure that i have one. just that i like this record a lot. the weeknd, tackled.
