The Weeknd is definitely up to something, but at this point it's still unclear what the big picture will be. The “Take My Breath” singer (who now goes by his birth name Abel Tesfaye) released yet another cryptic teaser video on Tuesday morning (August 6) as part of what's been dubbed “Chapter 3” in his musical evolution .
The three-plus-minute CGI video, titled “Unprepared Certainty,” arrived at midnight with no further explanation other than the visual starring a digitally animated toddler walking through a creepy hilltop house. “All I have is my… legacy,” Tesfaye sings at the start over eerie keyboards gushing against a computer-generated sky pulsating with lightning.
As the child follows a shrouded woman into the house, a host of dark keyboards give the muted piece a funeral, while the audience watches the child's progress and the piece takes on a slightly more open feel in the middle. “You can change locations/ You can change your name/ They'll always find a way,” Tesfaye sings in his signature falsetto over gently strumming acoustic guitars.
At one point, the kid strikes a pose with his left hand on his forehead, as if shading his eyes from a bright light, as he looks into a series of full-length mirrors that appear to show reflections of The Weeknd in a series of past incarnations , including his signature red suit After hours time. The video ends with the child sitting on the woman's lap, with Abel singing, “My mama told me it'll never be the same/They'll always find a way.”
At press time, a representative for Tesfaye had not responded Advertising signthe user's request for more information about the video.
The latest hint at the singer's next era comes after he teased a song that fans speculate is called “The Abyss,” which also featured a CGI video starring the unnamed baby and a similarly subdued track. This post was accompanied by a quote from the German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche, “when you look long enough into the abyss, the abyss looks into you…”
In another teaser video from July 18, Abel said, “There are three chapters to this tale,” along with CGI images of his red-suited character driving a car alongside some of his previous incarnations.
Two years after its release Dawn FM album, Tesfaye is set to return to the stage in September with a one-night-only concert in Sao Paulo, Brazil. The show is set for September 7 at the Estádio MorumBIS and promises a “never-before-seen production,” according to an earlier press release. The Live Nation-produced show in Brazil comes nine months after the singer appeared in Sao Paulo for two nights (October 10 & 11, 2023) during his After Hours Til Dawn tour at Allizanz Parque, as well as Rio's Estádio Nilton Santos de Janiero on October 7.
Check out the new video (and previous posts) below.
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