PND makes his presence known by covering the FADER’s April/May 2015 issue. The somewhat mysterious entity himself, finally gives his rising fanhase a little perspective on who he is. The OVO Sound’s next big draw speaks for the very first time on a variety of topics, including signing to the OVO Sound label, the ’90s R&B influence in his music and being compared to fellow Canadian crooner, The Weeknd.
Below, we have an insert from the interview with his reactions to the comparisons and after you can peep the cover shoot. To view the interview in it’s entirety, make your way over to FADER:
Critics often lump PARTYNEXTDOOR in with fellow Toronto-born, OVO-nurtured singer The Weeknd, but the comparison is lazy if not inaccurate. Though both artists sing songs that dissect the emotional tolls of sex and relationships from the perspective of the endlessly desired, The Weeknd’s music is considerably more detached, if not altogether devoid of the soul one finds in Party songs like “SLS” or “Let’s Get Married.” “People throw that [Weeknd comparison] over me because I came at a time where people assumed I was there to fill a void,” he says, alluding to The Weeknd’s departure from the OVO fold in 2012. And though PARTYNEXTDOOR’s music includes touchstones of the “dark” aesthetic The Weeknd became known for—mentions of drug use, screwed-up vocals, gloomy sax riffs—Party considers the idea an affront to his versatility. “A lot of things that came out of Toronto were darker at the time. But me? I’m all about colors. I’ll flip samples where one’s a completely dark song and the next one is a complete sexual song. People think my whole thing is a dark thing, but I don’t.”
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