ALBUM REVIEW: The Weeknd - Hurry Up Tomorrow
First new review of the year!
For years, Abel Tesfaye has been teasing the end of The Weeknd. After all, what life of excess and danger can last forever? The Weeknd’s character has been toeing a fine line for years now, filling his days with copious amounts of drugs, alcohol and women across a litany of glitzy, 80’s-tinged records. Starting with 2020’s After Hours and continuing with 2022’s phenomenal Dawn FM, Tesfaye has honed in on a style of synthpop that’s made him a global superstar, and if Hurry Up Tomorrow is this era’s finale, he goes out in the only way he knows: in the biggest way possible. HUT hits the ground running and never stops, loading up one massive pop track after another over the course of 84 minutes. It’s often close to crumbling under its own weight, but those years Abel of cultivating this sound ensure it flies instead of falling flat.
The flow of any Weeknd album is usually a major highlight, and Hurry Up Tomorrow is no exception. It’s even more impressive how easily these songs transition over such a long release, with the first seven or so songs being particularly smooth in shifting between one another. Those first few tracks set the tone for an epic affair, with “Wake Me Up” and “Cry For Me” taking their time to build gigantic choruses filled with cascading synths. “Sao Paolo” and “Open Hearts” take things up a notch, finding a sense of urgency in their clubby instrumentals to get your heart racing. It’s songs like these that have turned Tesfaye into a global sensation, and he continues to do them as well as he ever has.
Much of Hurry Up Tomorrow concerns the end, and while lyrically it still sticks to The Weeknd’s usual guns, there’s enough nuance to his words and his performance to keep you intrigued. After the record’s fast start, Tesfaye settles into a slower groove, meandering through his thoughts to ponder his mortality. While these more measured songs aren’t as immediately arresting as the opening gauntlet, the silky smooth vocals keep you engaged in this final spiral. The Weeknd begs for forgiveness on the superb “Give Me Mercy” and questions his choices on “Without a Warning” as his fans cheer him on. The flow continues to hold things together, like the way the outro of “Niagara Falls” leads into the main melody of “Take Me Back To LA”.
If anything, this album is definitely too long, but I feel like Hurry Up Tomorrow wouldn’t succeed if it wasn’t this long. The sheer amount of time The Weeknd needs to give this persona a proper sendoff is apparent from the get go, but there’s little about the record that won’t draw you into its world. This catch-22 of length is a testament to what Tesfaye has accomplished over the decade plus he’s taken to reach the pinnacle of pop success, and if Hurry Up Tomorrow is truly the end, I think there’s no better way to go out than this.
Verdict: 8.4/10
Check out other posts from my blog:
