Dawn FM, the new album from The Weeknd, is unanimous. The specialized media give it four stars. British daily The Guardian gives it a perfect mark.
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the New Musical Express, the Rolling Stone, the Spin and the Los Angeles Time decorated it with four stars.
“Abel Tesfaye confirms his status as a major artist with an album infected with the splendor of the 1980s”, can we read in The Guardian.
“This is one of the rare major albums which reward the listener for having engaged in listening, in order, to the pieces of this opus”, indicates the magazine. Spin.
Released this morning, the Toronto artist’s fifth studio album, which we see aged with a beard on the cover, arrives 19 months later. After Hours and the huge bomb Blinding Light.
In a magazine interview Billboard, last November, Abel Makkonen Tesfaye (The Weeknd) explains that this concept opus tells the passage between purgatory and what comes next.
“Imagine a dead auditor who finds himself stranded in purgatory. It’s like being stuck in a traffic jam and waiting for the light at the end of the tunnel. Dawn FM is a radio station that plays in the car and where the host guides the driver to the other side, ”he said.
Radio station
“You’ve been in the dark far too long. It’s time to step into the light. We are going to hold your hand and guide you through this painful transition ”, launches the radio host, on the title track which opens the album.
Courtesy photo
The cover of Dawn FM
Jim Carrey’s voice personifies the DJ of this fictional radio station. We also find on this album Lil Wayne, Quincy Jones and Tyler, the Creator.
Which does not mean that Dawn FM is a musically dark album. The Weeknd’s pop synth sounds and resonates. We recognize, throughout the 52 minutes of the album, sounds like Giorgio Moroder, Michael Jackson, Daft Punk and Depeche Mode. It’s very 1980s at times. An album that can be listened to from start to finish. A luminous disc.