The Weeknd, Ariana Grande drop animated 'Save Your Tears' video

After piquing the curiosity of fans by dropping a teaser earlier this week, pop singer the Weeknd has finally released a remix and video of 'Save Your Tears,' one of the standout tracks from his blockbuster 'After Hours' album, featuring Ariana Grande.

The 31-year-old 'Blinding Lights' star took to Twitter on Thursday (local time) and released the video of song. He wrote, " OUT NOW," and tagged Ariana.

The three-minute-twenty-five second video is an eye-popping and surreal mated treatment with renderings of both artists. It was directed by Jack Brown and produced by Blinkink.

The video plays into the 'After Hours' theme and storyline - it showcases a red-jacketed character, creating a doll that ends up looking like Ariana Grande.

The collaboration marks at least the third time the Weeknd and the 'Positions' songstress have worked together. The duo collaborated previously on Weeknd's 2014 song 'Love Me Harder' - which also marked his first collaboration with Max Martin, the most successful songwriter-producer of the past 25 years - and her track 'Off the Table.'

Variety reported that even before this remix, 'Save Your Tears' was one of the most successful songs from one of the most successful albums of the past decade: It is certified double platinum and has surpassed 1 billion streams.

It also continues a hot streak for the Weeknd that began back in November of 2019 with the release of the first songs from 'After Hours,' 'Heartless' and 'Blinding Lights.' The latter song was the fastest to reach 2 billion streams in Spotify history and is one of only four tracks to hit that mark.

Despite the pandemic, the Weeknd has had a monumentally successful past year: In addition to the success of 'After Hours' and its singles, he headlined the 2021 Super Bowl Halftime show, made memorable performances on the American Music Awards and the MTV VMAs.

The 'Starboy' singer has also donated more than USD 3 million to a wide variety of causes, ranging from Covid-19 charities and MusiCares to USD 300,000 for the victims of the explosion in Beirut last summer.

( With inputs from ANI )