Album Review: Echoes Of Silence The Weeknd

In the space of twelve months The Weeknd has provided us with a staggering three, free exceptional albums. House Of Balloons, the first, was a triumph that lit up 2011 like a flash of lightning in the night. Thursday was a little more subdued and, good though it was, a little less impressive. Echoes Of Silence completes the trilogy even more quietly. It also carries with it an emotion that we had not yet seen from The Weeknd: self-knowledge. Drugs, sex, and ghosts remain but Abel Tesfaye is now more conscious than ever of who he is and what his one-man-band means.

You can't tell that from the first track, though. D.D. is a glorious surprise. Noting the track name and Tesfaye's previous form you'd be forgiven for imagining it would be about breasts or some new name for cocaine. No. Instead it is a fairly faithful cover of the Michael Jackson classic Dirty Diana. From there we drift a little into atmospherics and gentle, warm textures. We never emerge. Montreal is all encompassing. Outside is quietly enchanting. Same Old Song is almost self-pitying, with our host taking a swing at the haters: “you said potential couldn't ever last this long”. It's some change from the drug-fucked, party-oriented man we met a little under a year ago.

Echoes Of Silence is another step from The Weeknd. For some it will be a step in the wrong direction. Perfectly named, Echoes Of Silence is a subtle indulgence; an acquired taste.