By: Staff Writer, Adhithya Rajagopalan
Abel Tesfaye, who is better known as ‘The Weeknd’, is undoubtedly one of the best artists of today. He is known for his catchy rhythms, relatable topics, and even his beautifully choreographed music videos. His unique takes on pop and emo pop in tracks such as “The Hills”, “Starboy”, and “Call Out My Name” have merited him countless awards and billions of streams, and his more recent projects such as “Blinding Lights”, and “After Hours” are spectacular to say the least. Recently, he has ventured into modernizing 80’s music, especially some styles of grunge and pop, and he has now displayed that with “Dawn FM”.
The album ventures deep into the recesses of 80’s music, and to its credit, has many notably laudable aspects. The production value of the album is immaculate: the project was presented almost like a story, and as such, the album flows very well; the tracks are laid out very thoughtfully to tell the story. The story concerns the aftermath of COVID, where his earlier works concerned earlier aspects. His album “After Hours” concerned his issues upon being forced to quarantine, mainly those of depression, of loneliness, and even of drug abuse and sexual relations, which were prominent themes even in his prior projects. Also, the creative additions to each song to add to the value of the listening experience were used perfectly.
However, while Dawn FM is creatively stacked, the actual content of the songs is very mediocre and repetitive. During my first few times listening to the album, I noticed that when I wasn’t paying full attention, I couldn’t tell when I was listening to a different song; they sounded so similar, and the subject matter was the same. “Is There Someone Else?” and “Starry Eyes” are consecutive tracks, and they have the same melody, the same chord progression, the same pace, and they talk about very similar topics: that of love, loss, and personal improvement. Other repetitive tunes included “Take My Breath” and “Sacrifice”, as well as “A Tale By Quincy” and “Out of Time”. Furthermore, there was simply much too little variation in the tracks’ genres. While one could argue this was intentional to maintain continuity and to stay in line with the narrative, his previous albums have had good continuity and variety, notably “Beauty Behind the Madness” and “Starboy”. It was impossible to not get bored quickly listening to the same medium-paced 80’s beats on repeat.
While it has its moments (especially the tracks “How Do I Make You Love Me” and “Take My Breath”), the album was, in my opinion, very drab and repetitive for such a reputed and “able” artist (pun intended).