In the past, Toronto-based R&B artist Abel Tesfaye (better known under his moniker The Weeknd) has addressed himself as the “King of the Fall”, and for good reason. Since Fall 2016 settled in, The Weeknd has dropped his third studio album, released an accompanying short film entitled “M A N I A”, and has even been enlisted by Puma as a celebrity designer.
His latest album Starboy truly reflects just what The Weeknd has become…a star. The 18-track LP features collaborations with Daft Punk, Lana Del Rey, and Kendrick Lamar. The highly anticipated record seems to have surpassed expectations, as the music streaming service Spotify has announced that The Weeknd had broken the single-day record for songs streamed by an artist. The record was shattered on November 29, just four days after Starboy's official release.
Although Spotify hasn’t released the figures for the broken record yet, but it will certainly be above 36 million times, which was what the number of stream previous record holder Justin Bieber had within a 24 hour period on November 13, 2015. Back in May, fellow Toronto rapper Drake also replaced Bieber in the top spot of Spotify’s most streamed artist of all time.
In addition to The Weeknd’s single-say Spotify streaming record, his latest album is also bound for a Number 1 debut on next week’s Billboard 200 chart, and could be third-biggest debut of the year behind Drake’s Views and Beyoncé’s Lemonade. On Starboy, The Weeknd enters pop territory without straying from his darker and explicate sonic roots. By the look of his immensely successful first week, The Weeknd is successfully expanding his fanbase while keeping the day one followers appeased.
