Review: The Weeknd sings about romance that’s fast, reckless

POP/ROCK

The Weeknd, “Dancing in the Flames”

It’s back to the mid-1980s synth-pop of Lionel Richie, Michael Jackson and Eurythmics in the new song by the Weeknd, abetted by the symmetry-loving production of two more producers, Max Martin and Oscar Holter. Pointillistic keyboard notes bounce in stereo over programmed drums, full of major-key optimism, as the Weeknd sings about a romance that’s like fast, reckless driving: “I can’t wait to see your face/crash when we’re switching lanes,” he sings in his sweetest falsetto. A tolling keyboard coda suggests an unfortunate outcome — made explicit in the video — no matter how catchy things were.

JON PARELES, New York Times

Soccer Mommy, “Driver”

The grungy chug of Sophie Allison’s guitar brushes up against a lilting vocal melody on “Driver,” the third single from “Evergreen,” the upcoming album from the singer/songwriter who records as Soccer Mommy. “I’m a test of his patience with all that I do,” Allison sings of a lover who calms her clanging neuroses. “‘Cause I’m hot and he stays cool, I don’t know why.”

LINDSAY ZOLADZ, New York Times

FKA Twigs, “Eusexua”

The title track from the coming album by FKA Twigs, “Eusexua,” isn’t exactly euphoric or sexy. Produced by FKA Twigs, Koreless and Earthearter, the track runs on nervous, hopping 16th-notes and distant chords under FKA Twigs’ whispery soprano before a beat fully kicks in. It’s anxious and tentative at first, wondering about a primal, possibly dangerous, possibly life-changing attraction: “Don’t call it love — eusexua.” Later, as the rhythm revs up, she promises, “You feel alone, you’re not alone.” But the propulsion falls away, leaving her “on the edge of something greater than before,” but dangling.

JON PARELES, New York Times

Suki Waterhouse, “Model, Actress, Whatever”

Stardom, by definition, is one of the rarest occupations. It’s also a wildly disproportionate topic for songwriters to take on. The immensely sly, self-conscious and droopy-voiced English model, actress and songwriter Waterhouse takes up the self-pity of a star in “Model, Actress, Whatever,” the title song of her new EP. It’s a slow-building waltz about what happens after making it big: “All of my dreams came true/The bigger the ocean, the deeper the blue,” she declares. She musters grandiose orchestral production to sum up a feeling of emptiness.

JON PARELES, New York Times

COUNTRY

Margo Price and Billy Strings, “Too Stoned to Cry”

Price and Strings lean into the tradition of country weepers to detail assorted miseries: loneliness, poverty, loss of faith, suicidal thoughts. It’s a stately waltz decorated by flatpicking guitar lines from Strings, while its chorus is so packed with intoxicants — wine, whiskey, pills, easy women, cocaine — that it’s bound to draw cheers and singalongs.

JON PARELES, New York Times

News releases

• Katy Perry, “143″

• Keith Urban, “High”

• Kate Pierson, “Radios and Rainbows”

• Fidlar, “Surviving the Dream”

• Bright Eyes, “Five Dice, All Threes”

• Jamie xx, “In Waves”

• Thurston Moore, “Flow Critical Lucidity”

• Neon Trees, “Sink Your Teeth”

• Nelly Furtado, “7″