The Weeknd

GUELPH CONCERT THEATRE

The first time Ethiopian-Canadian The Weeknd performed for his home city of Toronto, he drew a diverse crowd of hipsters, hip-hop heads, label A&Rs, Drake, and a handful of bigwig record execs, packing them all into The MOD Club on College Street, downtown.

Warner Bros. came away from that debut performance believing they were on the brink of signing a new, young and brilliant Drizzy Drake, but with a bigger voice. Sure, The Weeknd, known by his peeps as Abel Tesfaye, may have been a bit nervous that first go around, hugging the mic, trying to hide in plain sight with his camo attire, but hell, a little grooming and he’d be the next The Dream, right? Not. You know what The Weeknd did in response to Warner Bros.’ savvy offer? He made them fly the questionably-talented Rich Hil, son of fashion mogul Tommy Hilfiger and personal friend of Tesfaye’s, up to Toronto for a day to ‘work on a couple of records’, which have yet to see the light of day.

A couple of days later, Rich Hil released a video of himself signing to Warners, and The Weeknd, well, he responded to Warners the same way he’s been responding to the media all along. He gave them the silent treatment, aka the middle finger. The Weeknd may be a lot of things, but all we know for sure is that he’s 1) unfit for mainstream, 2) one-of-a-kind, and 3) a monstrous tease.

As Janet and I entered the Guelph Concert Theater in downtown Guelph, a small University town in rural Ontario, the first thing Janet noticed was the decor. “Look around,” she said. “This place used to be a goddamn church.” It was true. The decor consisted of old wood paneling, brown carpets, and a merchandise booth that could have substituted for an old school confessional. Not only was the locale provocative (at least mildly ironic, considering The Weeknd’s lurid subject matter), but the show was converted at the last minute from 19+ to all-ages, so all the underage kiddies with fake IDs could secure a spot on the segregated balcony, and enjoy their fair share of melodic drug references, tales of hard sex, and trap n**** shit. The opening act that evening turned out to be a local grunge band from Toronto, who did very little to tickle the crowd, who’s only concern was whether the three security guards (who appeared curiously similar to XO crew members) intended on enforcing the ‘No Smoking’ signs plastered up on stage.

Heck, was this all some sort of elaborate set-up, an April Fool’s gimmick but in early October? Janet and I got our answer the moment The Weeknd spun onto the stage doing a version of Lil B’s ‘Cooking Dance’, along with his accompanying band, who would have passed for The Roots on a slow night at Late Night, apart from one chick guitarist. After performing an amped up version of “High For This”, The Weeknd, dressed in dark colors, Yankees warmup, XO cap, blue chinos sagging overtop Polo boxers, yanked two of the ‘No Smoking’ posters off the stage and tore them into pieces, all the while giggling maniacally at his posse. Tesfaye then perfected his label-worthy trifecta by chugging a bottle of Hennessy straight from the bottle, slowly running his fingers beneath his nose for a final drug reference.

As you may have already suspected, there were no label execs or A&R fixers in attendance at Guelph, no witnesses to Tesfaye’s ‘monstrosity’ of a sophomore performance… and the XO boys seemed to like it better that way. Hell, who said The Weeknd couldn’t sing in front of an audience? Over the course of an hour, Tesfaye blasted through a sufficiently-amped setlist, which included, “High For This”, “Life Of The Party”, “The Morning”, “The Party & The After Party”, “What You Need”, “Lonely Star”, “Wicked Games”, “The Birds Part 1”, “The Birds Part 2”, among others. However, the standout of the evening had to be, “House of Balloons/Glass Table Girls”, during which the crowd got up on their toes, bouncing and chanting, “this is a happy house, we’re happy here, in a happy house, oh this is fun, fun, fun, fun, fun, fun, fun…,” before the beat oozed into a bass-heavy dubstep number, over which Tesfaye half-melodizes and half-flows.

“House of Balloons/Glasses Table Girls” is clearly not a hip-hop record, yet neither is it R&B, or dance/electro. The same goes for the majority of The Weeknd’s cuts, which are often too droned-out to be hip-hop, and too hard to be traditional R&B. The Weeknd has successfully branded his own genre, which consists of hard-hitting kicks, vicious basslines, spine-tingling guitar, amidst cries of falsetto directed at his closest n***** and bitches in the stands. Tesfaye spent about one quarter of his Guelph performance directing lyrics at different members of his crew, who were piled into a VIP section stage left. Some of those present were in-house producers, Illangelo and Doc McKinney, who quite frankly, didn’t appear anything like your run-of-the-mill hip-hop producers. They both had their heads shaved, wore white tees and leather jackets, and rarely smiled.

They looked 100% basshead. Now, when you watch Drake’s most recent video for “Headlines”, isn’t it rather obvious OVOXO has carved its own unique position in the industry, with dark clothes, dark beats, and dark lyrics? The Weeknd et al. are just an extreme extension of this ethos. If Drake’s Harvey Dent in OVOXO, then Abel Tesfaye must be Two-Face. The dude says it himself on Twitter, “this [rap] game needs a villain”.

The Weeknd closed Saturday’s sold out show in Guelph with an ear-splitting performance of “The Zone”, rather fittingly, since a screen of kush smoke had accumulated under the high ceilings. As the various band members jammed to their cathartic conclusion, Tesfaye displaying all his molars, hitting those final high notes, a completely different vibe swept over the crowd. No doubt they anticipated Drake to emerge from the dark curtains backstage to perform his verse on “The Zone”. So when he didn’t, everyone stood there on the floor, dumbstruck, not sure whether to go or to stick around.

After all, didn’t The Weeknd whisper into the mic before the start of the song, “I’ve got another surprise for you”. Hell, the dude knew exactly what he was doing, and it worked, well, almost. He teased fans to the point where they actually considered going home to purchase tickets for Sunday night’s performance in London, Ontario, the second of two back-to-back shows in one sublime ‘Weeknd’. How many of the Guelph fans actually turned out for Sunday’s show, I can’t be so sure, since I headed straight home to write this.

- Peter Marrack