R&B singer, songwriter and producer Abel Tesfaye, known professionally as The Weeknd, has returned with his sixth studio album “Hurry Up Tomorrow.” Despite his continuing popularity and his title as the second most listened to artist on Spotify, this album is designed to kill off the persona that is The Weeknd, with Tesfaye confirming this is his last album under that name. With this final album, Tesfaye attempts to take listeners on a climatic journey to the end through intense production, fantastic features and this dramatic dialogue he has with himself and his fans, debating whether to shed his legendary title or not.
“Hurry Up Tomorrow” was released on January 31, 2025, The Weeknd’s first album in three years. The album marks not just the end of the Weeknd title but also the end of his most recent trilogy of albums: “After Hours,” “Dawn FM” and “Hurry Up Tomorrow.” With “After Hours” and “Dawn FM” releasing two years apart, Tesfaye seems to have taken some extra time with this one. This may be in part because of Tesfaye’s ventures in television with HBO’s “The Idol.” It might also be the result of Tesfaye losing his voice at the beginning of a Los Angelesn LA show during his “After Hours Til Dawn” tour, an event that is mentioned to have shaken his confidence multiple times on the album.
The production on “Hurry Up Tomorrow” was worked on by different collaborators such as Mike Dean, Nathan Salon and Sage Skolfield to name a few. The production on this album has the same cinematic feel as it does on the previous two in his trilogy, but it feels much more climatic and triumphant. While “Dawn FM” featured the voice of Jim Carrey that helped transition one song into the next, “Hurry Up Tomorrow” uses seamless beat switches at the end of tracks to lead perfectly into their successor. This style allows the album to feel cohesive, enabling the songs to work together to form one immense story. It does, however, lead to a potential issue for fans who would rather go back to specific songs rather than the full album. Unless the listener is constantly looking at the tracks, it can be a bit confusing where one song stops and the next one begins.
Despite already informing fans this is The Weeknd’s last album, Tesfaye’s first words on the opening track “Wake Me Up” are “All I have is my legacy.” These words set a gloomy, foreboding tone that evokes the idea Tesfaye himself has not completely come to terms with this decision. This idea recurs throughout the album as Tesfaye struggles with fears of being forgotten, letting his fans down and starting again. The album is structured like a continuous fight with and acknowledgement of his emotions. The sixth track, “Baptized in Fear,” takes listeners to a rather dark place, delving into thoughts of being trapped under the tremendous weight of regret and shame. The following track, “Open Hearts,” lightens things up with a track about mending the wounds of heartbreak to open your heart to love once more.
The album explores a wide array of emotions and experiences, but each track brings listeners closer and closer to the death of The Weeknd. Along the way, though, Tesfaye brings in multiple surprise features that enhance certain tracks on the album. Travis Scott’s feature on “Reflections Laughing,” for example, provides and further develops Tesfaye’s message in the song that fame is ironically synonymous with isolation. Other features simply add to the emotion of the song, like with Lana Del Ray on “The Abyss.” Her ethereal performance combined with The Weeknd’s vocals and the backing track give listeners this feeling of finality on a track dealing with fleetingness of time.
The album reaches the end of its 22 track run with the titular song “Hurry Up Tomorrow.” At the album’s end, Tesfaye seems to have finally accepted his decision, having deemed it necessary to move forward. It seems that the persona that propelled him to stardom has now stunted him as a person. Whatever the future may hold for Abel Tesfaye as an artist, it will be something new.
Nevertheless, with an album of 22 tracks and a length of an hour and 24 minutes, Tesfaye leaves fans of The Weeknd with one last monumental project that successfully explains his choice while simultaneously giving fans the music they want to hear for the final time.
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