The Weeknd has debuted a new song ‘Tokyo’ with Japanese singer Yoko Takahashi as he kicked off the Asian leg of his ‘After Hours Til Dawn’ tour – check out footage below.
The Canadian artist – real name Abel Tesfaye – played the first of two shows at Belluna Dome in Saitama, near Tokyo, yesterday (September 19), where he gave the unreleased track its live debut.
During the performance, he was joined by Takahashi, who is best known for singing ‘A Cruel Angel’s Thesis’, the opening theme to the hugely influential 1995 anime series Neon Genesis Evangelion.
‘Tokyo’ incorporates elements of ‘A Cruel Angel’s Thesis’, while the accompanying stadium visuals featured characters from both Neon Genesis Evangelion and the video game NieR:Automata.
The Weeknd shared footage from the segment on social media afterwards, crediting it as: “Presented by YOKO TARO ft. YOKO TAKAHASHI.”
Presented by YOKO TARO ft. YOKO TAKAHASHI pic.twitter.com/a8wUBHV7k6
— The Weeknd (@theweeknd) September 19, 2026
Yoko Taro, the creative director best known for his work on the NieR series, was responsible for the visual presentation.
After joining Tesfaye for ‘Tokyo’, Takahashi also performed ‘A Cruel Angel’s Thesis’ for the Belluna Dome crowd as The Weeknd played along onstage.
Fan-shot footage of the performance has also circulated online – watch here:
‘Tokyo’ was performed again during The Weeknd’s second Belluna Dome show today (September 20), and the two shows are the launch of the final Asian stretch of the long-running ‘After Hours Til Dawn’ stadium tour, which will next head to Jakarta for concerts on September 26 and 27. Dates in Singapore, Seoul, Bangkok and Hong Kong will follow before the tour concludes in Kuala Lumpur on November 4.
‘Tokyo’ is the second unreleased song The Weeknd has unveiled onstage this year. In April, he debuted ‘Rio’, another collaboration with Anitta, during a show in the Brazilian city. That performance saw the pair joined by dancers and pyrotechnics, while an accompanying animated film was directed by Japanese filmmaker Takashi Miike.
The emergence of further new Weeknd material comes after Tesfaye repeatedly suggested that he intended to retire the stage name following his 2025 album ‘Hurry Up Tomorrow’.
The record completed the trilogy that began with 2020’s ‘After Hours’ and continued with 2022’s ‘Dawn FM’, and Tesfaye previously said he felt he had “overcome every challenge” as The Weeknd.
However, he reversed course during a Stockholm concert last month, telling the audience: “I’ll never disappear. I love this too much to ever disappear. I tested retirement a little bit, and I don’t like the way it feels. Imma be here forever with you.”
He doubled down on those comments earlier this week, telling GQ Hong Kong: “At one point I thought, ‘What if I just stopped?’ But then I realised what a waste all of that inspiration would be.
“I can’t let that happen. I had a glimpse of what retirement looks like, and it isn’t for me. It’s a real privilege to do what I do. There’s nothing else like this job.”
The ‘After Hours Til Dawn’ tour has been running since 2022 and became the highest-grossing tour by a male solo artist in history.
Earlier this summer, The Weeknd kicked off the European leg in Copenhagen, before playing two nights at Manchester’s Etihad Stadium and a sold-out five-night run at Wembley Stadium.
The post The Weeknd debuts anime-sampling new song ‘Tokyo’ with Yoko Takahashi as he kicks off Asia tour appeared first on NME.
