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Music

The Weeknd's Creepy Sexiness Was in Full Force at Barclays Center Last Night

He asked if he could make Brooklyn cum.

“Brooklyn! Can I make you cum three times? Can I make you cum four times? Can I make you come cum times?”

This is the only bit of stage banter The Weeknd indulged in last night during his headlining set at Barclays Center in Brooklyn. In retrospect, that The Weeknd would one day build a sustainable (emphasis here on “sus,” here) career out of being the world’s creepiest dude with the world’s most angelic voice was inevitable. Abel Tesfaye is, after all, a once-in-a-lifetime vocal talent, stuffed to the tips of his Basquiat-esque dreads with mystery and sensuality, perhaps the closest our generation has come to the hell-nightmare version of Sade.

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But place yourself in March of 2011, before the widespread cross-pollination of indie rock, British bass music, and R&B. Before Drake became Drake, with all the connotations that term implied. Before the unfortunate genre tag “PBR&B” was coined. There was only _House of Balloons, an out-of-nowhere mixtape released by an entity known as The Weeknd. It sounded like a Burial fever dream in some places, Lex Luger on codeine in others, and with the style, dark camp, and drug-fueled melodrama of _Less than Zero_ setting the tone throughout. It sampled Cocteau Twins, Souxsie and the Banshees, and Beach House (twice!), and it never felt like forced stunt-sampling. There were lyrics about snorting coke off of glass tables, having desperate and drugged-out and patently empty sex, and the heartbreak that comes from living an empty, frozen-faced lifestyle. No one knew who (or what) The Weeknd actually was, just that House of Balloons sounded like pure sex._

Slowly, the mysteries of The Weeknd were revealed, and we found out they weren’t really mysteries at all. The Weeknd was named Abel Tesfaye, he was from Toronto, and he was vaguely associated with Drake, who’d posted early Weeknd tracks on his blog. He’d been making music for years, but only recently had settled on the (possibly pilfered) aesthetic that made him famous. Ultimately, though, he was just some guy—albeit an extremely talented one—who sang songs.

And that—one extremely talented guy—was what the Barclays Center got last night. Tesfaye spent the majority of his performance onstage, alone, his backing band mostly hidden behind a video screen. Besides the aforementioned orgasm comments, there was little in the way of stage banter. When he danced, it was with delicate care—a crotch thrust here, a misguided air-guitar there—and these slight movements felt like events. For the most part, Tesfaye stood stoically at the microphone, singing in a voice as pure as the one on his records. Though minimalist, Tesfaye’s lithe tenor was strong enough to justify the rapt arena, full of enthusiastic, sometimes shockingly young fans.

Tesfaye’s performance stood head and shoulders over that of his opener Schoolboy Q, who gave a shaggy set more suited for a sweaty, rowdy rap club than the Barclay’s Center. The TDE rapper performed valiantly, sweat dripping from his bucket hat down to his considerable gut, as if he might die after his set but he was mostly fine with that. His set-up was odd—he and a band (featuring a DJ who spent a not-inconsiderable time chain-smoking blunts) performed over pre-recorded backing tracks, Q often acting as a hypeman for his disembodied vocals. He struggled to keep the crowd’s attention—they’d be with him for Tinashe’s “2 On,” to which he contributes a perfunctory verse, and the radio hit “Studio,” their enthusiasm waning during errant Oxymoron album cuts. Still, Schoolboy Q possesses a charisma and charm that can’t be measured by a single performance. He’ll ride again another day.