Trilogy by The Weeknd

However wasted an opportunity it is as an introduction to The Weeknd, Trilogy is still a staggering, near-perfect portrait of hedonism’s inherent depravity and bareness.

An r’n'b album with few equals in terms of narrational ambition, Trilogy doesn’t just expose or subvert the womanising male archetype of modern r’n'b, it destroys it, by rendering it quaintly one-dimensional. 

It's an exhausting journey, dark and disturbing with little respite, but in the end when those last chords fade away and you're left with the echoes ringing in your ears, it's a journey that's worth taking.

This is some of the the best music of the young decade; judging by its already pervasive influence, it's safe to say Trilogy (or at least House of Balloons) will be one of those records that will be viewed as a turning point when we look at the 2010s as a whole.

Trilogy takes one of the more singular bodies of work of the new decade and gives it a very modern bout of premature re-evaluation, image curating and real-time mythologizing

As a comprehensive document of a specific moment in time, Trilogy is untouchable. 

If we are to consider this compilation as a single document, then it’s a document of this limited, albeit mesmerizing, facet of the Weeknd’s persona.

If only it had that kind of focus. The disparate releases are as oil and water as ever, with a new song on each disc that doesn’t fit at all