A gigantic lighting rig descends to just above the crowd, then tilts to a 45 degree angle, like a huge cross between an origami structure and a Star Wars battleship. Suddenly, Abel Tesfaye – the Weeknd – appears to simply step out of the crowd and runs to the centre of the venue on a catwalk as thousands of voices scream. It’s hard to believe that less than seven years ago he was an underground artist in Toronto, whose audience consisted of customers in the clothes store where he worked.
Superstardom – and a US No 1 with recent album Starboy – has brought change and underlined his contradictions. His early mixtapes in particular depicted a shadowy, amoral, drug-plying sexual predator, but much of Starboy depicts a more tender, vulnerable, consoling lover. It’s hard to know if Tesfaye is the bragging “motherfucking Starboy”, or the product of a single-parent family who “ran out of tears when I was 18” and tells interviewers he wants to please his mum. As he will be aware, that enigma is central to his appeal.
If Reminder finds him irked that singing about cocaine landed him “a new award for a kids’ show” and Ordinary Life frets that celebrity will bring an early death, few performers have taken to its demands so comfortably. He never stops smiling, performs within feet of his adoring public all night and commands the audience’s arm-waving as sharply as a military general.
Similarly, he has shifted from underground electronica to mainstream pop, but draws on electro, rap, R&B balladry and soul. He samples 70s post-punk (Siouxsie and the Banshees), 80s pop (Tears for Fears and the Romantics on Secrets), Snoop Dogg and Pharrell. Die for You even features heavy metal guitar shredding.
It all holds together because of the glue of his Michael Jackson falsetto, and he delivers 28 songs as seamlessly as a mixtape. He’s a feminist (“I want to hear all the women …”) and an old-school charmer (“I’d be nothing without Manchester tonight”).
False Alarm’s pounding stomp feels rather crass, but other songs expand to fill the live arena. With a three-piece band on point all night, Rockin’ is innocent pop thrill-turned-mighty banger. With the origami structure descending close to Tesfaye’s new short hair, Can’t Feel My Face turns the place into a pop-up disco. Sublime Daft Punk collaboration I Feel It Coming unites the arena in waves of joy.
There are flickering shadows of the old darkness in the harder funk edge of Tell Your Friends and in the lingering references to emotional detachment, fellatio and narcotics. “When I’m fucked up, that’s the real me,” he insists on final encore The Hills, but after singing for the best part of two hours and saying little beyond effusive thank-yous we know no more about Tesfaye than we did at the start. Still, judging by the ecstatic reaction, there can be few complaints.
• At the 02, London, 7 and 8 March. Box office: 020-8463 2000. Then touring.
