There was nothing we had heard like that before from Abel. Monte Lipman, co-founder/CEO, Republic Records: During a playback of an early version of After Hours in the studio, I was like, “Whoa, what was that?” We actually made him play it a couple more times. Tesfaye: GTA: Vice City really opened my eyes to a lot of ’80s music, so there was a nostalgia for when I was a kid playing video games and listening to Hall & Oates and Michael Jackson while driving through the city.Īhmad “Belly” Balshe, co-writer: Getting to watch the great Max Martin and Abel create is a dream in itself, and I’m just beyond honored and proud to be a part of something this legendary. We all felt this song was very special even early on in the process. He took a risk, and that was very impressive to us. Max Martin, co-producer/writer: Abel came with the vision of what the song should be, which was a very different tempo and vibe than what is usually done. You can only imagine how quick those songs came. So I was excited to be in the studio again with collaborators I love. The material came easily and quickly - he recorded After Hours tracks “Scared To Live” and “Save Your Tears” during the same session at New York’s Jungle City Studios as “Blinding Lights.”Ībel “The Weeknd” Tesfaye: My Dear Melancholy, was one of those things I had to just get off my chest, and I didn’t really want anyone’s input. He convened an all-star crew - including Swedish superproducer Martin, who had helped him score his first Hot 100 No. 1 with “Can’t Feel My Face” - as well as longtime collaborators and co-writers like Jason “DaHeala” Quenneville and Ahmad “Belly” Balshe to channel his love of 1980s pop music and video-game soundtracks into radio-friendly anthems. “There Was Nothing We Had Heard Like That Before From Abel.”Īfter exorcising some personal demons with the 2018 EP My Dear Melancholy, - a dark, muted throwback to his early work - Tesfaye was ready to play pop star again on his fourth studio album. ‘Blinding Lights’ went into the zeitgeist and became one of those songs that just had this emotional impact on so many people around the world.”įrom a fateful studio session to its high-concept rollout to its influence on his upcoming fifth album, Tesfaye, his closest collaborators and members of his team share how one of pop music’s most historic hits came to be. “And it’s just one of those cases where the stars aligned. “From the first time I met Abel, it was clear that he was destined for global stardom,” says Republic Records co-founder/CEO Monte Lipman. And with cinematic, high-concept visuals and performances that took him all the way to the Super Bowl halftime show - all starring a mysterious red-jacketed, increasingly bruised and bandaged character Tesfaye played throughout - “Blinding Lights” and the album that accompanied it, After Hours, also cemented Tesfaye as not just a radio fixture, but an auteur in his own right. Though Tesfaye, 31, had topped plenty of charts before, the adrenaline-pumping synth-pop track (created with help from legendary songwriter-producer Max Martin) marked the final stage of his evolution from enigmatic breakout of Toronto’s underground R&B scene to genre-busting icon. In early 2020, the singer born Abel Tesfaye released an ominous music video that saw him doing his own little shuffle, swaying his hips and gingerly tapping his feet to a song, “Blinding Lights,” that had debuted just two months before - and which would soon leave its own mark on pop history. The Weeknd: Photos From 2021 Billboard Cover Shoot (Due to changes in chart methodology over the years, eras are weighted differently to account for chart turnover rates during various periods.) To this day, Checker boasts on his website that it’s an achievement no one else will claim “until 2065.” The song and dance were simple but irresistible: Thanks to separate chart runs in 1960 and again in 1962, “The Twist” was named Billboard’s all-time Hot 100 No. 1 single in 2008, a designation that factors in total weeks on the chart as well as exact chart positions, with weeks at No. 1 earning the greatest value and weeks at No. 100 earning the least. In celebration, Billboard is launching a special collection of trading cards which will be followed by the debut of a limited-edition NFT collection.Ĭhubby Checker once described the steps of his 1960 chart-topping hit “The Twist” as someone swiveling their hips, swinging their arms in the opposite direction and twisting their feet as if they were putting out a cigarette. 1 song on Billboard ’s Greatest Songs of All Time Hot 100 Chart. The Weeknd’s “Blinding Lights” is the new No.