We only had to wait a few days for The Weeknd to follow up his new After Hours album with even more new music.
Indeed, Abel surprise-dropped the deluxe edition of his After Hours experience overnight, complete with a "Heartless (Vapor Wave Remix)" featuring Lil Uzi Vert and a Chromatics-assisted take on "Blinding Lights."
The deluxe-ified version of The Weeknd's latest also features an OPN remix of "Save Your Tears," a remix of the title track from The Blaze, and the audio from his Saturday Night Live performance of "Scared to Live." Stream it all below via Spotify.
Shortly after the drop, Abel fielded a few inquiries on Twitter regarding the once-rumored release of a blue-themed deluxe edition featuring new songs. Per Abel, such a thing does not exist:
After Hours is dedicated to the memory of a fan named Lance, a.k.a. XOPODCAST.
"You were one of the true original backbones of the XO fan base," Abel said last week. "Can't believe I'm finding out about this today. I'm dedicating After Hours to you, my friend." Belly also shared a tribute message.
First week projections for the album place it somewhere in the neighborhood of more than 400,000 equivalent album units, with a HitsDailyDouble-estimated 200,000 or more of those expected to come from traditional album sales. If these estimates hold, that'll give Abel the biggest first-week run of 2020.
The standard edition of the album has surpassed 150 million global streams since hitting Spotify on Friday, and is nearing 1 billion total streams, while also notably bagging the top 12 spots on Apple Music's Top 100 chart and the top 14 spots of Spotify's Top 15 chart in the U.S. Single "Blinding Lights," meanwhile, set a new record for the year as the greatest gainer on Spotify's Global Chart by hitting 8.5 million daily streams and the top spot on the chart for the 25th day.
Fans looking for new merch will be pleased to learn that Abel has been teaming with BAPE, New Era, Mitchell & Ness, and Murder Bravado for limited runs. Keep it locked to the official shop for continuous updates.
