The Beginning

February 16, 1990. In our eyes this was the day a legend was born, a man who has changed our lives both because of his musical talent, which has brought a whole new level of alternative R&B, and because of his lovable personality. Abel Makkonen Tesfaye was born to parents Samra and Makkonen in Scarborough, Ontario. He always had that love for music, in fact at an early age he had already developed an interest in artists like Michael Jackson. As well as at an early age, Abel's father left the family, resulting in his grandmother having to raise him. This allowed him to speak fluent Amharic.

At the age of 11, Abel had already began smoking marijuana and later moved on to harder drugs. When Abel was in highschool, although, he decided to drop out, and he and his good friend Lamar took their mattresses and threw them in a van. Later on, Abel developed the music duo Bulleez n Nerdz where he rapped as Kin Kane, and also wrote songs when he was associated with a company called The Noise.

When both of those projects didn't get him too far, although, him and his friends created the record label XO and Abel earned the name The Weeknd. The name meant "the weekend they dropped out of school and never came back" and Abel didn't include an E in his name because of copyright issues with an already existing band named The Weekend. In 2010, Abel anonymously uploaded 3 songs on his YouTube channel, What You Need, The Morning and Loft Music, and they were a success. People were calling him for interviews, although Abel declined them because he not only wanted to remain a mystery, he was also self conscious and felt he had nothing to say.

On March 21 2011, he released his first mixtape, House of Balloons, and shortly after, followed up with two other mixtapes, Thursday and Echoes of Silence, which were available for free download on his website. All three mixtapes, although did not show his face, and nobody knew what Abel looked like until his first performance at the Mod Club in Toronto.

People were starting to discover his unique style and amazing vocals, and even huge rap artist Drake fell in love with his music, that he tweeted his lyrics as well as claiming to be one of his biggest supporters, Abel was beginning to have a growing fanbase.

This was just the beginning of an iconic and even legendary superstar who captures the hearts of millions of fans today, and who knows how much bigger he'll get. With a total of 71 awards in the last couple years including two Grammy's, as well as gold, platinum and 3x platinum records, its safe to say Abel is one of the biggest male stars of todays generation.