Every so often the music world manages to produce an act that manages to straddle the poles of nostalgia and current pop culture in a way that’s makes you truly excited. The Weeknd are this act. Somewhere between nineties Save the Last Dance-esque r’n’b grooves and the ambient electronic pop somersaults of today’s charts, the internet’s most lauded Michael Jackson cover artist has managed to assemble not one, but three records worth of music that will physically move you.

Abel Tesfaye sets things in motion with the sort of voice that haunts your dreams like your darkest dream of a pop star. His vocals standalone as impressive, however when paired with aching arcs of shimmering sound effects and harmonies evocative of soul from the shadows of the nineties, his genre fusion develops. On the first record here, Tesfave’s lyrics take issue with unreciprocated love and mindful trickery on ‘Wicked Games’, while the ‘The Party & The After Party’ sounds like a lost Genuwine track. His records run the gamut from the smooth and logical tracks like these from the first disc to the choppy and unpredictable fascinations of the second disc. This record walks the line between the satisfyingly chaotic (‘Life of the Party’, ‘Gone’) and the tracks that sounds just that bit too much like a bad Justin Timberlake b-side (‘The Zone’, which even the feature of Drake can’t make interesting).

The finest part of this collection comes in the final portion. By far the most glossy of the efforts featured here, we are dropped in the center of what Tesfave does best- deconstructed pop music so shiny it near blinds you. This is his cover of MJ’s ‘Dirty Diana’, which serves as an accomplished testament to his vocal range and ability to work with existing matter. With this first, the rest of the tracks seem to saunter in, rather than storm, until ‘Same Old Song’ which leads the latter half of the record to a successful finish. Loaded with anthemic surround sound devices ‘The Fall’ twists and turns to inspire devoted listening, ‘Echoes of Silence’ delicately entices and  ‘Til Dawn (Here Comes the Sun)’ sets up the record for a spectacularly unpredictable and evocative finish.

This is a varied collection, but maps the explorations and evolution of this vocally and lyrically tender artist well. A diverse introduction to Tesfave’s enigmas and abilities, the Trilogy provides an ideal opportunity to experience how the Weeknd reflects and refracts the potential of pop music yet to come.