The Weeknd Teases New Music, Next Chapter of After Hours / Dawn FM Trilogy in Elab

Publish date: 2024-09-10

The Weeknd doesn’t do anything by half, and a day after he announced a September concert in Brazil that will feature a “never-before-seen production,” he dropped an elaborate video teaser of what his next project will look and sound like — and it’s the third and final chapter in his “After Hours” / “Dawn FM” / TBD trilogy, which he hinted to Variety last year will have a visual component, possibly a film, as well; the new video concludes with the written words, “There are three chapters in this tale.”

The minute-plus-long clip, posted in his Instagram story, is a surreal series of dream-like images from the last four years of his musical career: There’s the sports car, poker theme, red suit and sunglasses and sports car he sported in “Blinding Lights” and the other videos from his blockbuster 2020 “After Hours” album, segueing into the old man imagery from “Dawn FM,” then the hooded characters featured in his “After Hours Til the Dawn” tour, and then new elements come in. There’s a character, possibly a mannequin, wearing a mask that looks very much like his own face (he wore a lot of masks on the tour) and, in the conclusion, a character that looks like him as a young boy, surrounded by a horde of white mannequins reaching for him. Throughout, hazy music plays, largely synthesizers and massed Weeknd vocals, which are presumably blurry remixes of new (and possibly older) material.

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The clip concludes with a ray of sunlight hitting the boy’s head and spreading out as grass and flowers grow, adding up to a fairly obvious death-redemption-rebirth theme.

It actually all ties together with the vague hints he gave Variety during an interview mostly about his HBO drama “The Idol” in June of 2023. Asked if there would be new music after “The Idol” and after the tour, he replied:

“I’m finishing the third part of this of this saga, of this trilogy,” he said. “The name of it will come out soon, but it’s not called what some fans think it’s called… what they think it’s called is actually a song on the album, but that’s not what the actual album is called. [It’s unclear which speculative title he’s referring to.] So I’m just gonna say that.”

He dropped a few more, small hints throughout the conversation, but demurred when asked for specific details:

Variety asked, “So there’s an album coming, and there’s a film or some video project attached to it. And it would seem there’s a redemption-rebirth-revitalization theme to it.”

He replied, after a long silence, “Uh, I’m not answering any more questions about that!” (Laughter)

It’s likely more will be revealed at the concert, which will take place Sept. 7 at Sao Paulo’s Estádio MorumBIS and is produced by Live Nation, will debut a “never-before-seen production,” according to the announcement. The Weekend has largely been off the radar since completing his “After Hours Til Dawn” tour of North America and Europe last year and starring in “The Idol” last summer. The stadium tour played to more than 3 million people over two years.

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