GoneTrending

“Trust me girl / You’ll wanna be high for this.” Quite the bold statement coming from someone who you couldn’t even make out in a crowd.

The lyrics from “High For This,” The Weeknd’s House Of Balloons opener, embody everything the artist stood for: drugs, dependency, and defenselessness. It’s hard to picture The Weeknd (born Abel Tesfaye) as anything but an international megastar. But upon the release of his debut mixtape, which celebrates its 10th anniversary today, he was merely a faceless enigma.

At the time, no one knew what a “The Weeknd” was. It was unclear if Drake’s right-hand producer Noah “40” Shebib was behind it after Drake’s manager Oliver El-Khatib posted a handful of The Weeknd’s songs on the OVO blog in 2010. Critics didn’t know if it was a solo act or an R&B group, and fans only saw shadowy black-and-white photos he posted during the mixtape’s rollout. Even the cover art was obscure, featuring a woman in a bathtub whose face was hidden by balloons with only her left breast exposed. All we had was a voice: a light tenor that could go from sweet to dangerous in a quick octave change. The mystery looming over his artistry is what lured listeners in.

“In the beginning, I was very insecure. I hated how I looked in pictures,” Tesfaye revealed in 2013’s career-first interview with Complex. “I was very camera shy. People like hot girls, so I put my music to hot girls and it just became a trend. The whole ‘enigmatic artist’ thing, I just ran with it. No one could find pictures of me. It reminded me of some villain shit.”

And what a villain he was. Rather than the typical monster you see in action films, House Of Balloons introduced Tesfaye as a villain who forced the gloomiest parts of your life into the spotlight.

The mixtape’s title is ironic: a balloon-filled house sparks images of carnival-like bacchanal. But it compared despair to a straggler that simply won’t leave the party. The Weeknd’s music was as captivating as it was chilling, as he utilized his Michael Jackson-inspired falsetto to reveal a revolving door of emotionless sexual escapades that were often brought on by drug binges.

The general public was introduced to The Weeknd when he packaged his 2011 mixtapes (House Of Balloons, Thursday, and Echoes Of Silence) into the major-label Trilogy re-release the following year. But listening to the House Of Balloons mixtape is the only way to ingest its authenticity (he’s since tweeted the original release with its intended mixes and samples will be on all streaming platforms on Sunday).

Aaliyah’s “Rock The Boat” sample that opens “What You Need” adds to its seductive allure as Tesfaye puts on his dirty macking best. The ending of “The Knowing” is more explosive as he confronts both his and his girl’s infidelities. The singer shares his adoration for dream-pop duo Beach House, as their 2008 song “Gila” is the base for the uncharacteristically heavenly “Loft Music” and “The Party & After Party” samples 2006’s “Master Of None.”

“The Party & After Party” is a nearly eight-minute-long opus, with The Weeknd promising that he’ll provide his girl with an endless supply of cocaine and sex. The track turns sadder and more manipulative in the second half. “Gimme right attention or I’ll start drowning from my wrist,” he mutters. It’s a bleak moment that reveals just how dependent he is.

And of course, there’s the definitive trio: “High For This”, “Wicked Games” and “House Of Balloons / Glass Table Girls.” The heart-stopping production of “High For This” isn’t as glossy as the re-released version, with the singer handholding a fearful lover into a world filled with drugs. “Wicked Games” (no relation to Chris Isaak’s 1989 hit) is him at his most vulnerable and sleaziest. Sex is a transactional tool to mask shame, trading it for a baseless promise of fame.

“House Of Balloons / Glass Table Girls,” which has since become The Weeknd’s signature song, is the mixtape’s highlight. This mix is actually glitchier than the mastered version; laid atop a heavy sample of Siouxsie And The Banshees’ 1980 single “Happy House,” “House Of Balloons” is chaotic in its debauchery. It’s peak euphoria that is accented by the rattling bassline, needle-sharp synths, and that hair-raising falsetto. The rapid comedown occurs on “Glass Table Girls” as the singer darkly urges girls to test out the 707 glass tabletops. His creepy advances are bolstered by woozy bassline and chopped & screwed vocals. Singing about drugs isn’t new in music, yet The Weeknd personalizes it with self-deprecation as he shamefully reveals predatory instincts.

House Of Balloons is frightening in its relatability. It forced listeners to confront the loneliness they feel after realizing partying is the only thing that sustains them. There’s no joy in watching the sunrise on the loft’s rooftop. Rather, its harsh sunlight calls attention to bloodshot eyes, a parched mouth following endless rounds of alcohol, a red nose caked with residue, and overall desperation. I can say this all because I was just as reckless. Being only a year younger than Tesfaye, we had parallel coming-of-age experiences: dabbling in similar substances, using all-night college parties as escapism from depression, and ultimately sought comfort in a mixtape that targeted a shared despondency.

The mixtape reflected a doomed generation who grew up with films like Kids, Trainspotting, Requiem For A Dream, and A Clockwork Orange. We didn’t want to be seen. Like Tesfaye, we hid our faces behind Tumblr photos that showed both a brilliant, snarky sense of humor and a not-so-subtle cry for help.

“It definitely changed the culture. No one can do a trilogy again without thanking The Weeknd,” he told Rolling Stone of the mixtape’s impact in 2015. “A lot of artists started doing things faster and quicker after that: Justin Timberlake dropped two albums in a year, Beyoncé dropped a surprise album. I’m not gonna say any names, but just listen to the radio. Every song is House Of Balloons 2.0.”

It’s partly true, as House Of Balloons and its follow-ups found mostly white critics who previously shunned R&B all of a sudden praising it. They dubbed it “PBR&B”, a nod to the inexpensive beer often drank by hipsters. But the movement surrounding The Weeknd and counterparts like Frank Ocean, FKA Twigs, Miguel, and Tinashe surpassed whatever trend critics wanted to brand it as. It sparked a refreshing sonic shift in R&B that called back to the experimentation seen during the late ‘90s neo-soul era and the peaks of Prince, Janet, and Michael Jackson’s careers.

Artists like H.E.R., PARTYNEXTDOOR, and DVSN (the latter two signed with Drake’s OVO Records) were shrouded in similar mystery as Tesfaye, while frequent collaborator Future exposed his dark battle with drug use. Even Drake got into the mix, with Tesfaye’s credits sprinkled atop a murkier-sounding Take Care at the end of 2011 (he later revealed “Crew Love,” “Shot for Me,” and “The Ride” were supposed to be on House Of Balloons). And just last year, The Weeknd sparked controversy after claiming Usher’s 2012 “Climax” single ripped his early sound. He later clarified while co-producer Diplo acknowledged the influence. “When I heard those early records they blew my mind,” he tweeted. “Soulful in their silences, and a spacey iconic voice that felt uniquely internet. The idea of R&B having dark edges was what I wanted to bring to Usher.”

The Weeknd’s career trajectory is absolutely bonkers. There have been more sinister moments pre-crossover fame (Echoes Of Silence’s terrifyingly coercive “XO/The Host” and the nightmarish “Initiation” that alludes to gang-rape, and the John Carpenter-inspired screams on 2013’s Kiss Land title track). But he’s now a bonafide pop star; he was Oscar-nominated for 2015’s “Earned It,” won three Grammys, he teamed with pop masters Max Martin and Daft Punk, he has five chart-topping singles, he had a Super Bowl halftime show (he tributed “House of Balloons / Glass Table Girls”), and his recent single “Blinding Lights” made history was the first song to spend a year on Billboard’s Hot 100 top ten.

But the remnants of House Of Balloons haven’t dissipated, from haunting singles like “The Hills” and “Party Monster” and the entirety of 2018’s bleak My Dear Melancholy to his continued work with the mixtape’s original producers Illangelo and Martin “Doc” McKinney. There are still broken pieces to Tesfaye. But he’s now learned how to piece them all together.

The Texas Longhorns are dancing no more. In the final game in the opening round of the 2021 NCAA Tournament, No. 14 Abilene Christian went blow-for-blow with the No. 3 Longhorns, and thanks to one of the most inspired defensive efforts you’ll ever see, managed to come out on top at the very end. When the dust settled after Wildcat forward Joe Pleasant hit a pair of cold-blooded free throws, ACU picked up a 53-52 win.

The story of the game was how Abilene Christian, which came into the game tops in the nation at turnover percentage, taking the ball away from Texas over at will. In a scene reminiscent of Longhorns coach Shaka Smart making the Final Four with VCU behind his “havoc” defense, ACU forced 23 Longhorns turnovers over the course of the game. That, combined with the Wildcats absolutely mauling UT on the boards (they had 20 offensive rebounds compared to Texas’ five), meant that even though they went 20-for-67 from the field, the Longhorns just got up so few shots (18-for-40) that it did not matter.

Still, Texas was right there at the end. Battle-tested guard Andrew Jones got a look to put his team ahead in the game’s waning moments, and his shot could not have been more pure.

On the ensuing possession, an attempted layup by ACU’s Reggie Miller went horribly awry, but the ball fell into the hands of Pleasant, who was fouled with 1.2 seconds left.

Pleasant, a 58.5 percent shooter, made them both, and after Texas’ hopes of a miracle went awry, Abilene Christian picked up its first NCAA Tournament win in program history over the university that runs its state.

To celebrate, one Wildcat threw up a Horns Down, which will certainly go over well in the greater-Austin area.

The win was historic in that it marks the first time in Tournament history that four teams seeded 13th or higher will advance to the second round. Abilene Christian will play next on Monday, when they’ll take on the UCLA Bruins.

Tenet became the film of the pandemic over the course of 2020, for better or worse. Christopher Nolan’s insistence that the film debut in theaters saw it delayed several times over the course of the year, finally seeing the dark of theaters (the ones that were open, anyway) in the fall in the United States. After all that waiting, the actual film saw a mixed bag of reviews and left many of those who made their masks smell like popcorn a bit, well, confused about what actually happened in the film.

For those that may not have seen it, or need another run at the movie to figure things out, HBO Max delivered some good news. The streaming platform’s Twitter account shared on Saturday that Tenet would finally come to HBO Max on May 1.

The news came with a trailer for the movie, which after all those delays is actually a good reminder for some what Tenet even is about. And though it’s a movie that was supposed to arrive nearly a year after the announcement, the news is significant. Nolan was insistent that the movie not debut with a streaming element, pushing for a theatrical run against all odds. But the time has finally come for the film to join the rest of the Warners new movie lineup on HBO Max.

If anything, the news offers even more weird ways to watch Tenet on various devices that would require a lot less work than putting the movie on five Game Boy Advance cartridges.

The Los Angeles Lakers won’t have LeBron James for a while, as the team’s do-everything forward is out indefinitely due to a high ankle sprain he suffered on Saturday afternoon against the Atlanta Hawks. While chasing after a loose ball, Hawks forward Solomon Hill landed on James’ leg, and the reigning NBA Finals MVP went down in pain.

After the game, Hill was called out by two of of James’ teammates. Lakers forward Montrezl Harrell and guard Dennis Schröder both spoke to the media after the game and accused Hill of not making a normal basketball play when James went down.

“A guy dove for a loose ball, took his leg out from up under him,” Harrell said, per Dave McMenamin of ESPN. “I really don’t feel like it was one of those loose-ball plays. He had to go through his leg to get the ball, man. He was turned sideways. The ball was behind him. I mean, you’re jumping at an angle, going across this way, I mean, I don’t know how you feel that’s a loose ball.”

Schröder shared this sentiment, calling it an “unnecessary play.” In response to all of this, Hill took to his Twitter account and made clear that his intention was not to hurt James, saying that doing so would be disrespecting the game.

The Hawks would go on to beat the Lakers, 99-94.

Zack Snyder’s four-hour Justice League cut finally hit HBO Max this week, and perhaps it’s the length of the film itself that’s delayed some reactions to what’s inside the reimagined superhero team-up. There are some big differences in the film, starting with a much more robust role and backstory for Cyborg. But that’s just the start of the changes for the R-rated film. And interestingly, one of the biggest fan reactions online was to the movie’s big bad, Steppenwolf.

Sure, he’s only one of the bad guys in the movie, with Darkseid looming large over everything in the Justice League universe. But he’s the one doing all of the work, searching the globe for the motherboxes he needs to be redeemed among his marauding conqueror brethren.

His new look in the Snyder Cut initially drew a lot of jokes when we first got a look at him last year. But after four hours of battling and anguish (mild spoilers ahead), people had a much different read on the character. A lot of people, well, thought he looked kind of adorable.

A mashup of Steppenwolf from the new cut even got the fancam treatment.

Fans actually felt bad that Steppenwolf tried very hard to keep up his end of the bargain and find redemption, only to not get much help from the other bad guys in the movie.

Some fans even pitched that Steppenwolf was the real hero of the Snyder Cut.

Whether that’s a bit too far is all your call, of course. But there’s a lot of movie there, so it’s no surprise that there are plenty of different interpretations of it all when you finally see it.

The Los Angeles Lakers will be without the services of LeBron James for the foreseeable future. According to multiple media reports, the injury that James suffered on Saturday afternoon against the Atlanta Hawks has been ruled a high ankle sprain, and there is no timetable for him to return to action.

James suffered the injury on Saturday afternoon against the Atlanta Hawks. Solomon Hill dove for a loose ball and ended up rolling on James’ right ankle early on in the second quarter, which sent the reigning NBA Finals MVP down to the ground in serious pain. James attempted to stay in the game, but after making a three determined that he was unable to compete.

An x-ray on James’ ankle reportedly came back negative, which certainly is a relief for the Lakers, but losing him for an indefinite period of time can only be described as a disaster for a team that is already without Anthony Davis, who is likewise out for an indefinite period due to achilles tendonosis.

Currently, the Lakers sit 28-14 on the year, putting them in third place in the Western Conference despite being the same number of games back of the 1-seed as the Phoenix Suns. In the ultra-tight West, though, they are only four games ahead of the 7-seed San Antonio Spurs, which would put them in the play-in tournament if they fell that far.

The final game of the opening round of the 2021 NCAA Tournament will not take place. The NCAA announced on Saturday evening that the tilt between Oregon and VCU has been ruled a no-contest, citing issues due to COVID-19 with the Rams. As a result, the Ducks will move on to the round of 32.

In a statement, the NCAA said that it could not identify specific players or personnel members who tested positive, and it is unclear if this is a matter of multiple people testing positive or contact tracing holding out close contacts.

The game was set to be the 7-10 matchup in the West Region — Oregon was the higher-seeded of the two squads — with the winner moving on to face the winner of the 2-15 game between Iowa and Grand Canyon.

For the fifth time in eight years, Texas Southern won the SWAC and qualified for the NCAA Tournament. Still, as a lesser-known school, participating in March Madness means that the university gets a spotlight on a national stage, something that is always really cool, even if the Tigers have danced a few times over the years.

This usually means that schools get a few fun “Do You Know?” segments at one point or another when they play. For the HBCU out of Houston that took on Michigan on Saturday afternoon, this included a pair of their most famous alums getting shouts: Former NFL player and current television personality Michael Strahan, and Grammy Award-winning rapper Megan Thee Stallion.

Ian Eagle was tasked with reading this, and because he is Ian Eagle, he decided to have a little fun with this. When Megan’s name came up, Eagle joked that she passed along a message to the team and proceeded to do an impression that was less than stellar.

Eagle is a pro, and he’ll do a few silly things whenever he’s calling a game in any sport, but I’ll level with you: I did not anticipate him doing any part of “Body.” Just call him Ian Thee Eagle.

Kanye West’s net worth has been a topic of interest this week, as some new fashion deals made the rapper give himself the title of the world’s richest Black man. According to a report from Bloomberg, his new net worth was somewhere in the range of $5.1 billion and $6.6 billion. These numbers could be credited to his Yeezy brand which was valued between $3.2 billion to $4.7 billion and the brand’s partnership with Gap, which was reported to be valued as high as $970 million.

West was thought to have $122 million in cash and stock, $110 million from his music catalog, and $1.7 billion in other assets, but according to Forbes, these numbers were grossly inflated. The publication recently reported that the aforementioned numbers were based on West’s speculative wealth and not on the actual money and assets he owns.

According to calculations from Forbes, West’s net worth is about $1.8 billion, a significantly large drop from the initial numbers. The correction comes as his Yeezy company was altered for a $1.5 billion valuation and not the $3.2 billion to $4.7 billion range that was initially given. Forbes added that the $970 million number of the Yeezy and Gap partnership is extremely speculative since the brands’ first collaboration has yet to be released.

Forbes also said that West’s reported $1.7 billion in assets was exaggerated, as the actual number is $160 million. This number was calculated based on a balance sheet that was obtained from the rapper’s team. The value of his art, jewelry, vehicles, furniture, and livestock proved that the $1.7 billion was inaccurate.

Despite the correction, West’s net worth still experienced a jump from $1.3 billion to $1.8 billion since he was announced as hip-hop’s second billionaire last year.

Justin Bieber is a little over a day removed from the release of his sixth album, Justice. While longtime Beliebers are happy that the new project is finally here, many of them hoped it would contain one of the singer’s unreleased songs— namely “Red Eye,” which was not made available on his album Changes following its debut in the singer’s 2020 documentary Seasons. While the song is not on the digital version of his sixth album, Bieber has given his supporters another way to get their hands on it.

The “Peaches” singer announced on Saturday that fans could obtain “Red Eye” by purchasing a special edition of Justice from his website. The song, which lists British DJ Troyboi as a guest act, can be bought on three different editions of Justice, each one boasting its own cover art.

The release of Justice didn’t come without a bit of controversy. Bieber faced some criticism for including Martin Luther King Jr. clips on the album. However, the King family gave Bieber the thumbs up for the move. “Thank you, @justinbieber, for your support, in honor of #Justice, of @TheKingCenter’s work and of our #BeLove campaign,” Bernice King, MLK’s daughter and CEO of The King Center, wrote in a tweet.

“Red Eye” is available for purchase on Bieber’s website here.

Justice is out now via Def Jam. Get it here.