Abel Tesfaye launched his profession greater than a decade in the past by releasing music underneath the mysterious stage moniker The Weeknd. However after scooping greater than a dozen Billboard Music Awards, 4 Grammy Awards and billions of streams within the years since, it seems like he may be able to say goodbye to the unhealthy man.
“I’m going by way of a cathartic path proper now. It’s attending to a spot and a time the place I’m on the point of shut the Weeknd chapter,” the singer advised W Journal in a brand new cowl story alongside his The Idol co-star Lily-Rose Depp. “I’ll nonetheless make music, perhaps as Abel, perhaps as The Weeknd. However I nonetheless wish to kill The Weeknd. And I’ll. Ultimately. I’m undoubtedly making an attempt to shed that pores and skin and be reborn.”
In the event you adopted the story line of the singer’s 2020 After Hours album, you might need gotten the sense that Abel was already setting out on the trail of The Weeknd’s demise given the quantity of bloody harm his alter ego suffered within the movies for the LP’s singles. “The album I’m engaged on now might be my final hurrah as The Weeknd,” he added of his untitled subsequent assortment. ” That is one thing that I’ve to do. As The Weeknd, I’ve mentioned all the things I can say.”
Although it seems like inhabiting The Weeknd has taken its toll on Abel, he mentioned slipping into the guise of cult chief Tedros on the upcoming HBO musical drama The Idol additionally had an emotional and bodily impression on him. “I needed to take off the Weeknd outfit, placed on Tedros’s wig, shoot with [Rose’s character] Jocelyn, then return to being The Weeknd,” he mentioned of the mind-messing back-and-forth between his two personas.
“Then, after the live performance, I misplaced my voice. No voice got here out in any respect. That’s by no means occurred earlier than. My principle is that I forgot the way to sing as a result of I used to be taking part in Tedros, a personality who doesn’t know the way to sing,” he mentioned of the devious character on the heart of the collection slated to premiere on Max on June 4. “I could also be wanting too deeply into this, nevertheless it was terrifying. As The Weeknd, I’ve by no means skipped a live performance. I’ve carried out with the flu. I’ll die on that stage. However there was one thing very sophisticated happening with my thoughts at that second.”
See some pics from the W shoot under.
Tyler Mitchell
Tyler Mitchell