It’s been five years since The Weeknd burst into our headphones with an R&B sound we hadn’t heard before on his debut mixtape, House Of Balloons.

He went on to give us 30 tracks that year, while revealing nothing about himself, and while he may now be a household name following the success of Beauty Behind The Madness and in particular Can’t Feel My Face, the Toronto artist has no plans to water down his sound. At least, that’s what we’re taking from the news that Abel is back in the studio with the team who helped create House Of Balloons.

The Weeknd at the Met Gala
(Clint Spaulding/AP)

Explaining to Vogue why he cancelled a bunch of commitments this year, including touring with Rihanna, he said: “Creatively, some magic is happening right now, and I don’t want to lose it.

“It could be an album or it could be something else, but whatever it is, music is being made.”

But just because he’s working with the same team behind his seminal mixtape, doesn’t mean we should expect the same sound: “But it’s a new thing,” he told Vogue. “Always a new thing.”