The Weeknd Reveals What His Bloodied and Bandaged Face Gimmick Was Leading To

The Weeknd released the music video for “Save Your Tears,” the latest installment in the After Hours video saga and reveals the product of his bizarre bloody and bandaged look from the 2020 American Music Awards and other live appearances. The new video opens with the artist toting some serious plastic surgery — including botched botox and various fillers — on stage performing in front of a masked crowd in some sort of masquerade ceremony. (Much like the previous injuries, the “surgery” is artificial, and the singer’s true face is as normal as ever.)

As he dances his way through the crowd, The Weeknd proceeds to treat his audience as if they’re manikins watching his show. He drinks from the table’s glasses, rests his arm on the head of an audience member, he even gives a few of the audience members a champagne shower before making his way back to the performance stage.

Because of the strange masquerade ball and a few context clues, XO fans are speculating the artist is making a few statements — some aimed at the Grammys (which are being pushed back after some controversy) and some aimed at Hollywood at large.

At one point in the video, the Weeknd sings to a gold trophy before quickly throwing it off to the side. To be expected, fans immediately made the connection to the upcoming awards show, especially after the artist accused the Recording Academy of “corruption” when his recent album received zero nominations.

“i think Abel is showing us how constantly pressured he feels to be ‘perfect’ by the industry, grammys etc,” one fan wrote. “so now he got that botched up face and i think at some point he will have an alone again mv where he takes it off and learns to love himself for who he is.”

“Him performing for these masked people could symbolize artists having to perform and do things for the Recording Academy in order to get nominations, maybe even wins,” another user speculated in a thread.