The 50 Best Weeknd Songs

The first song co-written with pop magus Max Martin, “In the Night” conjures an Eighties neon raincloud with a whoosh of drum pads, pulsing synths, clattering effects, and Visionquest pathos. Principally, it coaxes Tesfaye’s most openhearted vocal to date. His taut yet fluid phrasing (a nod to Thriller-era Michael Jackson) delivers the story of an abused sex worker with an unusually sincere ache. —C.A.

“Moth to a Flame” is a petty anthem, masking the bitterness with synth, and marks the Weeknd’s first (of hopefully many) collaboration with Swedish House Mafia. Abel’s vocals shine through a biting chorus that effectively ruins the current relationship of his ex. It should come as no surprise that a list of the Weeknd’s best songs doubles as a masterclass in toxicity. —W.A.

The remarkable opening of “Crew Love” is a true test for the Weeknd, pitting the singer’s siren call against a callous, punishing opponent — a mash of crashing cymbals that seems intent on crushing the life out of anything in its path. But the Weeknd’s sweet croon partially camouflages his own militance. His opening line is every bit as cruel and cutting as those cymbals: “Take your nose off my keyboard/What you bothering me for?” And once the Weeknd puts his enemies on their heels, he presses his attack. “This ain’t no fuckin’ singalong,” he snarls prettily. “So, girl, what you singing for?” —E.L.

Oh, the humanity? On this neoclassic Weeknd tale of compulsive wanderlust, boosted by Illangelo’s crisply cavernous, dubstep-tinged production, Tesfaye coos (and even cries out) with new vulnerability about whether a commitment to “real” love/life might be a risk worth taking. Answer: No, “but, girl, I’m so glad we’re acquainted.” —C.A.

Released as a Soundcloud track and a YouTube video in commemoration of his 2014 “King of the Fall” Tour, this is a fan favorite that didn’t get added to streaming services until nearly six years later. It finds the Weeknd at his most insouciantly boastful: “’Bout to leave the crib with a couple of my pirates/Driving by the streets we used to walk through like a triumph,” he sings. Produced with help from Jason “DaHeala” Quenneville, “King of the Fall” has a thrilling, uncompromising edge. When he says, “If you ain’t with me, motherfucker, you against me,” you can feel the tension in his words. “Ain’t nobody can stop me.” —M.R.

This first single from the 2020 album After Hours finds our hero self-consciously returning to his baller ways, grabbing some of his pals (co-writers Metro Boomin, Illangelo, and Dre Moon), loading up on subdermal bass and trappin’ hi-hats and heading out for a night of licking toads, getting ladies high, and spilling whiskey on himself. Once again, he’s in full players-playing mode and he doesn’t make it sound very fun at all. —J.G.

On the Weeknd’s most intense recorded reckoning, our unreliable narrator delivers a harrowing moral: Don’t fall for self-obsessed, predatory fiends (like me) or somebody will suffer. Forever. Producers Illangelo and Doc McKinney underscore the point — sobs and a gunshot bleed into reverbed whirlpools of decaying surf guitar, an unforgiving snare thud, and Marina Topley-Bird croaking “sandpaper kisses, paper-cut bliss” like Madame Lamort. Then the crows caw a bitter adieu. —C.A.

When Republic Records introduced its hot new R&B act to the world, it used an old-fashioned tactic (Trojan Horse) the new-fashioned way: an Ariana Grande song. Produced by Max Martin, “Love Me Harder” is a coy, synth-driven jam about the joys of rough sex. What takes it to that next level is the indelible way Grande’s sumptuous vocals ricochet off of the Weeknd’s icy falsetto. Two great artists in their own right. But like Pat and Neil, these two just belong together. —S.G.

“Loft Music” is one of Abel Tesfaye’s quintessential baby-making moments and a standout from his debut mixtape, House of Balloons. During the chorusless first half of the track, the Weeknd convinces a woman that “baby, it’s OK” for them to hook up, while the second half features a haunting, three-minute outro. —T.M.

“Adaptation” is Kiss Land‘s most direct tour-life lament, essentially Massive Attack featuring the Weeknd, slightly pitch-shifted. Over a breakbeat loop, an eerie echo chamber, and a gnarled, ghostly sample of the Police’s “Bring on the Night,” Tesfaye explores his vocal range and imagines tipsy young models as vessels of pure, uncut love. It all sounds exquisite, but his regret is a false confession. —C.A.

It’s appropriate that the Weeknd at his most publicly distraught — after breakups with tabloid damsels Selena Gomez and Bella Hadid — would be soundtracked by elegant techno brutalist Mike “Gesaffelstein” Lévy. Hello, stylish dystopia. A piercing synth siren swoons and keens above clacking desolation; when the beat later brightens to a warped gurgle, Tesfaye turns spiteful, suicidal. Call it his safe space. —C.A.

“I know it hurts to smile, but you try to,” Tesfaye croons to his dirty Diana through the smoky air. Can’t you feel the weight of his stare? “In Your Eyes” has such a suave Eighties groove, it takes real concentration to appreciate its manifold layers. Tesfaye mined late New Wave bands like Roxy Music, A-Ha, and Cocteau Twins for the song’s backbone, let Max Martin do his pop wizardry, and let the sax rip. —S.G.

On this theatrical text to an ex, the Weeknd tries acceptance! Co-producer Frank Dukes suspends the mournful inamorato amid a swell of supportively filtered keys, and Tesfaye counsels himself to move on. But a fingersnap beat enters and he instinctively reaches for his old woes. Synths encase everything, his multitracked wail fades to vocoded static, and it’s clear: litigating sin is his one forever love. —C.A.

Coming on like Smokey Robinson at a black mass, Tesfaye crooks a finger, howls into the death-rock void, and cues the riding-crop percussion. Is this just another dubiously consensual orgy between a rich, coked-out female fan and some fame-adjacent, coked-out music bros? Or does the woman actually represent Tesfaye’s conflicted feelings about his own career choices? Regardless, be careful out there, kids. —C.A.

Just when you think the Weeknd has finally released a vacuous little earworm of a pop song, he twists the knife. “I saw you dancing in a crowded room/You look so happy when I’m not with you,” he sings. It would be like if you took “Nothing’s Gonna Stop Us Now” and replaced Mickey Thomas with Sade. This love-forsaken-at-the-club song wouldn’t be anything without Grande. Together, their voices are indestructible, which makes this particular song all the more harrowing. —S.G.

The Weeknd sounds alluring on “Try Me,” a highlight from 2018’s My Dear Melancholy. The EP swirls with romantic anguish and the singer’s high-profile breakups; “Try Me,” where he pleads for an ex-girlfriend to come back to him in haunting, gauzy tones, is no different. Some listeners speculated that this was his attempt to recapture his House of Balloons-era bona fides after the world conquering Starboy. But when he sings lyrics like “Once you put your pride aside, you know where to find me,” he sounds sincere. —M.R.

“Wanderlust” hinted at the brightly uptempo, Eighties-inspired pop that eventually launched the Weeknd to superstardom.  Produced with help from DannyBoyStyles and DaHeala, it makes fanciful use of Dutch group Fox the Fox’s 1984 synth-pop hit “Precious Little Diamond,” as the Weeknd depicts a La Dolce Vita life that’s full of thrills and short on love and commitment. It’s a metaphor for the first rush of success, and a predictor of bigger fame to come. —M.R.

On a trap-chic stroll through the Weeknd’s hipster rags-to-branded-riches story (Morayama, Coachella, and Mercedes are name-checked), Starboy relies on the lovely lilt of his voice to redeem pop-rap groaners like “futuristic sex, give her Philip K. Dick.” And it does, buoyed by a suave whoosh here and chilly wobble there. —C.A.

‘Can we meet in the middle,” the Weeknd offers over the elegant romanticism of “Less Than Zero.” His despair has rarely sounded so vulnerable, and his need to connect has rarely seemed so genuine, as he reaches out further and further with each new ascending keyboard bloop. The result might be his greatest slow-dance entreaty. —J.D.

Compared to the slick dance pop found elsewhere on Beauty Behind the Madness, “Shameless” is an outlier. A stripped-down acoustic ballad that has shades of peak-period Seal, “Shameless” is a triumph of cringe for the Weeknd. “I’ll always be there for you girl, I have no shame,” he swears to a sometime lover who doesn’t want anything from him except the oblivion of a good lay. It’s icky, and the slippery, pornographic guitar solo at the end only adds to the feeling of self-loathing sleaze. —J.F.

The stunning closer from Starboy, the Weeknd’s Michael Jacksonesque voice flows freely over Daft Punk’s retro-futuristic, Eighties-inspired disco-pop production. Lyrically, the Weeknd sheds his lustful approach to sex as he assures the object of his desire that she shouldn’t be so afraid of falling in love. —T.M.

If there’s a song that captures the Weeknd’s determined progression from brooding club lurker to incandescent pop king, it’s “After Hours,” which starts with echoey synth acrobatics from his early releases. A dance beat trickles in slowly — just hints of it at first — and eventually takes over, thrusting the Weeknd closer to the melodic maximalism that swept him up and blasted him to superstardom. —J.L.

It takes a lot of skill to make desperation sound catchy, but the Weeknd barely bats an eye as he combines iridescent synth-pop with his urgent, pleading falsetto on “How Do I Make You Love Me.” Just when it seems like he’s reached a breaking point, the song becomes a freeform experiment in electro blips and bleeps that seamlessly transitions into “Take My Breath,” highlighting the tightknit sonic universe of Dawn FM. —J.L.

There’s something singular about “Hardest to Love,” its drum and bass break beat setting it apart from nearly everything else in the Weeknd’s catalog, to say nothing of the North American pop charts (it would obviously feel less out of place in the U.K.). Yet the song doesn’t feel like some tossed off genre experiment or blatant play for a new audience. It remains a quintessential Weeknd tune, that distinct drum and bass groove paired perfectly with woozy, weeping-willow synths and Tesfaye’s heart-melting, self-flagellating vocals. —J.B.…

After “Earned It” became a massive commercial success, it’s no surprise that the Weeknd returned to the same well a few years later — “Call Out My Name” is another slow-drip ballad set in 6/8 time. But where “Earned It” had those peppy strings and uplifting message (“Girl you’re perfect, you’re always worth it”), “Call Out My Name” is desolate and hollowed out, a parched tale of dependency and despair shot through with the Weeknd’s piercing, anguished wails. “I said I didn’t feel nothing baby,” he sings. “But I lied.” —E.L.

The Weeknd has said that “What You Need” is nothing more than a “sexy R&B song,” but that explanation underplays the kind of emotional power he conjures here. It opens with a loop from Aaliyah’s “Rock the Boat,” and centers on a raw and direct entreaty shorn of contemporary R&B gloss. When critics and fans refer to the Weeknd as a generational artist, particularly in his early years, it’s due to seductive performances like this. —M.R.

“Sidewalks” finds the Weeknd wryly recounting his ascent from growing up without a father and experiencing homelessness to the pop mainstream. “My flow too sick, Kevin Costner couldn’t touch me,” he trills in an Auto-Tuned voice over a guitar-inflected Doc McKinney beat. Meanwhile, Kendrick Lamar responds with a bouncy verse that flips Starboy’s theme about prodigious appetites. “It wasn’t just a random Kendrick Lamar verse,” the Weeknd told Beats 1’s Zane Lowe in 2016. “It was something special.” —M.R.

“The Party and the After Party” not only has a chipmunk sample of dream-pop duo Beach House’s “Master of None” at its center, but also a waltz-like rhythm reminiscent of the Velvet Underground’s “All Tomorrow’s Parties.” The Weeknd’s lyrics betray an impressive attention to detail. “Louis V bag, tats on your arms, high heel shoes make you six feet tall,” he croons. “But I’ve got what you need.” Midway through, the track switches to a highly sexual volley of vocal thrusts and flickering guitar, as he tries to illustrate “the feeling that I’ll give to you.” —M.R.

Over a tear-jerking sample of “Ben Sana Vurgunum,” by Turkish singer Nükhet Duru, the Weeknd boasts about the sexual freedom he gets by being a “young god” in his hometown of Toronto. “She asked me if I do this every day, I said often,” he sings on the chorus. The alt-R&B song gave fans their first taste of the leap forward he was making with Beauty Behind the Madness. —T.M.

After the world-conquering success of Beauty Behind the Madness, the Weeknd could have worked with anyone. He chose Daft Punk’s Thomas Bangalter and Guy-Manuel de Homem-Christo, who lent an attractive electro gloss to his next chart-topping smash, French-filtering his vocals on the hook as he literally laughed his way to the bank. With its winking lyrics about old Star Trek movies and ivory lines on ebony tables, “Starboy” was also the Weeknd’s chance to show that pop stardom hadn’t changed him — it just made him even cockier. —S.V.L.

This track was originally co-produced by Mike Dean and intended for Kanye West, who co-produces and raps on the bridge here. Framed by a coolly twilit soul sample, Tesfaye croons a list of  basic starboy gripes. but quickly the lyrics grow belligerent, as stabbing piano chords propel an antihero eruption. “Don’t believe the rumors, bitch, I’m still a user,” he smirks, as if he’s pimp-strutting on the ledge. —C.A. 

A response to those criticizing his pivot to a mainstream sound after Beauty Behind the Madness, The Weeknd returns to his vibey, R&B origins, promising he’ll reinvent himself as many times as he wants to. And boy, has he succeeded at it. T.M.

Though the first drowsy lines of “The Morning” masquerade as expected Weeknd club sleaze, the song is a surprisingly radiant hustler’s anthem, catching him at an upbeat moment before the blowback from his late-night debauchery sets in. The electric squeals of a guitar follow him as he builds toward a bursting chorus — and once the peak hits, he sings with the carefree indulgence of someone throwing confetti made of dollar bills into the air. —J.L.

It figures that one of the Weeknd’s most straightforwardly danceable songs would be about a kink so intense that it can literally cause death. Propelled by the titanic melody of Max Martin and collaborators Belly, Andrea Di Ceglie, Luigi Tutolo, and Oscar Holter, “Take My Breath” throbs with the insistent kick drum, funky guitar, and arpeggiated synths of classic Giorgio Moroder. Tesfaye coos soulfully, deploying his upper register while describing a woman who asks to indulge a fantasy that sounds a lot like erotic asphyxiation. “Bring me close to heaven, babe,” she tells him. The extended version on Dawn FM features an instrumental breakdown that shreds Tesfaye’s voice into a guttural wail, further blurring the line between ecstasy and horror. —J.F.

The second half of this track is one of the most viscerally affecting entries in the Weeknd’s whole catalog, as icy and thunderous as an avalanche. He throws himself into the world beyond blotto: Faces are blurring, the drunks are getting mean, and the threat of violence fills the air. The Weeknd’s voice has always drawn comparisons to Michael Jackson’s, but “Glass Table Girls” draws its lineage back to Prince at his most paranoidly perfect. —E.L.

Wherein the most sexually explicit songwriter of the PornHub era makes the lead single for the Fifty Shades of Grey soundtrack. “Earned It” (and a very-NSFW video) introduced perfectly Tesfaye’s silk-sheets vibe to mainstream ears. Written in D-minor, which, as  Spinal Tap taught us, is the “saddest key,” “Earned It” is  a Grammy-winning chart-topper full of strings severe and seductive, that falsetto and, of course, a love too weird to last. —J.G.

“You want to be high for this,” trills the Weeknd on the opening track of his first, career-launching House of Balloons mixtape. It’s a perfect introduction to the Weeknd’s groundbreaking aesthetic: an opiate atmosphere, a sound that hovers between darkwave and bedroom R&B, and endless sensorial delights. Cirkut’s beat is a synthesized whirl of throbbing, stop-start percussion and eerie, organ-like keys, all fodder for the Weeknd to red-pill his listeners: “Open your hand/Take a glass/Don’t be scared/I’m right here.” —M.R.

One of the Weeknd’s biggest hits was a dashed-off afterthought. Tesfaye was hanging out with some of his songwriting collaborators, listening to “some modern, disco-y influenced tracks,” as he once said, when they all felt the urge the jam. The whole song — three and a half minutes of R&B-inflected pop with a bouncy, beautifully numbing chorus that may or may not be about cocaine — came together in 40 minutes at the end of Tesfaye’s Beauty Behind the Madness sessions and almost didn’t make the cut. But Tesfaye believed in the song, which became a Number One hit and has since been certified eight-times platinum. —K.G.

Tesfaye has always been great at packaging pop thrills in deep despair (and vice versa). The nihilistic despair of this Dawn FM gem is neatly tucked away in the song’s gasoline-soaked sheen. Even its darkest lines — from “I know you won’t let me OD” to “In this game called life/We are not free” — are barely detectable in the midst of all that New Wave euphoria, like the Weeknd had too much fun getting high to the Cars. Please cover “Drive” next. —A.M.

Nine years after the Weeknd declared “Cali is the mission” on “The Morning,” he backtracks on this cautionary tale, revisiting a theme that’s prevalent throughout his discography: an obsession over the Hollywood lifestyle that’s just as strong as his contempt for it. Four minutes in, the vibe switches (getting somehow darker) and the Weeknd tells the tale of a Chrome Hearts-clad woman who waits for him to cut his verse before moving on to … other activities. Considering how good this song turned out, we appreciate her patience. —W.A.

No pop sound is too dated for the Weeknd to have some fun with: As long as it’s got a little sparkle, he’ll find a way to use it. “Blinding Lights” broke chart records by leaning all the way into a synth-pop jingle that sounds like a Eurovision contender or a mid-2000s ringtone, singing the hell out of each hook in a vaguely Goth accent and daring you to call him cheugy. It’s so spectacularly catchy, you’ll never get the chance. —S.V.L.

The Weeknd’s first single is a sensual, slow-grooving meditation on coming of age — feeling comfortable in your own skin and grappling with differences between love and lust, but “only for tonight.” In the space of five and a half minutes, Tesfaye tells a movie-length story: He’s just broken up with his girl, he took out all his cash and spent it on coke and his date, and he just wants to feel like a human being. “Bring your love, baby, I could bring my shame,” he sings. “Bring the drugs, baby, I could bring my pain, I got my heart right here.” It’s heavy stuff for a pop song, and it established him as an artist who could tackle Big Problems in a way that makes you want to sing along with him. —K.G.

A sound-design masterpiece and the quintessential Weeknd hit, with all the pop instincts of his crossover blockbuster era and all the sleaze and self-loathing of his avant-R&B early years. “The Hills” mesmerizes and rebukes like a MIDI-enabled version of Francisco Goya’s Saturn Devouring His Son. Tesfaye limps through fame’s panopticon before launching into a falsetto war of the spirit (“When I’m fucked up, that’s the real me,” he wails). Somehow, this meticulous smear of muted screams, tolling bells, growly sub-bass, and filtered-to-hell synths reached No. 1 and was eventually certified diamond (10 million copies sold). —C.A.