NEW ALBUM: The Weeknd - 'Starboy'
- Meganne Gerbeau
- Dec 1, 2016
- 3 min read
Seeing as The Weeknd’s previous album ‘Beauty Behind The Madness’ was the most streamed in 2015, fans weren’t wrong in expecting something big with ‘Starboy’. NME gave it 3 stars, HNHH averaged it at 83%, Rolling Stone also gave it 3 stars, and me…? Well, I think it’s alright.
Where do we even start? This album is pretty long, totalling at 1 hour and 8 minutes with 18 tracks. Considering his last album was only released a year ago let’s hope that these tunes are not rushed.
Songs I liked:
- ‘Starboy’ with its catchy beat and strong vocals, I’ve already heard it a lot around so I guess it’s doing pretty well. It’s already doing pretty well in the charts.
- ‘Stargirl Interlude’ but that’s all thanks to Lana Del Ray’s beautiful voice.
- ‘Ordinary Life’ is a bit repetitive but aren’t all the successful songs we’ve come across these past few years a bit repetitive? Listen to ‘Work’ by Rihanna – need I say more?
WATCH: THE WEEKND - 'STARBOY' FT. DAFT PUNK (OFFICIAL VIDEO)
The rest of the album:
‘False Alarm’ is a reaaaaalllyyyy weird one. The more I listen to it, the more it grows on me. At moments this track really reminds me of something Crystal Castles would come out with. Crazy. The music video for this track is well produced making it look as if you're playing a violent video game. It’s definitely worth a watch (see below), however I must add it is a little bloody. ‘Die For You’ feels like something a overdramatic teens would say to their first crush: “I would die for you, I would lie for you”. So basically the Weeknd’s whole fan base? Unfortunately, the rest of the tracks feel like ‘fillers’ for the album, nothing really stands out. Tracks like ‘Attention’ and ‘Love To Lay’ are disappointingly rather boring.
WATCH: THE WEEKND - 'FALSE ALARM' (OFFICIAL VIDEO)
The Weeknd hasn’t done himself any favours for bringing in fresh new fans, if you didn’t like ‘Beauty Behind The Madness’ chances are you won’t like this album. I feel like The Weeknd is sometimes like marmite, some tracks you love and some you hate. However, in terms of pleasing his current fans there’s no problem – you’ve still got his whiny vocals, heavy beats and catchy melodies. This was proven in the fact that 'Starboy' hit number 1 on iTunes and had a total of 400 million global streams in the first week of its release. Impressive stuff.
Picking up more awards in the year to come shouldn't be a problem? (Photograph credit: Frederick M. Brown)
The Weeknd has worked with a mixture of artists on this album, drawing in fans from a wide array of genres. Future will bring in the rap and grime heads with ‘All I Know’, house and dance lovers will appreciate Daft Punk’s involvement on ‘Starboy’ and ‘I Feel It Coming’ and fans of Lana Del Rey and Kendrick Lamar will be happy with ‘Stargirl Interlude’ and ‘Sidewalks’.
Overall ‘Starboy’ is ok, and along with NME and Rolling Stone I would probably give this album 3 stars. I think it was rushed, it must be. ‘Beauty Behind The Madness’ was so good and this is just so so. For me, I know I’ll be sticking to tracks prior to ‘Starboy’ like ‘The Hills’ and ‘The Birds Pt. 2’ rather than branching out to his newer stuff.
*Updated: Sunday 4th December 2016: 14:01*
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