“I Heard You’re Married” by The Weeknd (ft. Lil Wayne)

There is a prevailing and totally unsubstantiated theory that from The Weeknd’s perspective, the intended addressee of “I Heard You’re Married” is none other than Ariana Grande. Such assertions read a lot like clickbait, especially when you take all of the lyrical evidence into consideration.

Most notably in that regard, the narrative plays out as if the vocalist struck up a romantic relationship with the addressee before discovering that she’s actually someone’s wife. That’s the logic behind the titular phrase, i.e. The Weeknd only now ‘hearing’ that homegirl is “married”. And as alluded to at the end of the first verse, this is someone who initially hid that fact from him.

Is the Addressee really Ariana Grande?

In contrast to the above, even though Ari-chan didn’t marry someone famous, when she wed Dalton Gomez, it made headlines all around the world. So it would have been totally impossible (if she were the addressee) that The Weeknd didn’t know she was married beforehand.

Also, Ariana didn’t get around to tying the knot until mid-2021, which would have been after she and The Weeknd had their hypothesized fling. So it wouldn’t make sense that this song is about Grande unless The Weeknd is actually singing about being in a relationship with someone who is engaged instead of actually married – which Ariana was, to less fanfare, from December of 2020 until jumping the broom in May of 2021. But all things considered, coming to such a sensational conclusion, that this song is about her, would really be stretching things.

For instance, The Weeknd isn’t necessarily known as the committed, monogamous type anyway. However, in this piece, he is actually encouraging the addressee to leave her man and be with him if she isn’t truly in love with her spouse. And it’s hard to imagine Abel actually trying to lure Grande away from Dalton Gomez, as he doesn’t seem overly interested in a celebrity romance these days. On top of that is also the fact that doing so would have caused a huge scandal. Furthermore, based on other songs dropped in recent years, he is practicing more of a loose sexual lifestyle for the time being.

Leave your Man!

But more to the point as to why the vocalist is encouraging the addressee to do such a thing is that the former doesn’t deem it proper that the latter should be cheating. Or as he puts it, what’s the purpose of being married if you’re compelled to cheat? 

But of course, the vocalist is taking such a stance from a selfish standpoint. That is to say that he wants the addressee to himself, which is more or less why he’s encouraging her to leave her husband. 

And going back to the Ariana Grande theory, it did appear that she was in fact in love at the time she married Gomez. Or if not, that would beg the question as to why she did so in the first place, as we would have to presume that she had more than enough romantic options or could’ve even remained a playa herself.

Lil Wayne steps in

And it is really Lil Wayne who drives the thesis sentiment of this piece home, that the vocalist is not the type of guy who’s down with sharing the woman he loves with another guy. So even though he and this apparently married woman do enjoy an edifying rapport, Weezy is giving her an ultimatum of either being with him or her husband. 

And to reiterate, the title of this song is actually “I Heard You’re Married”. And along those lines, it is never truly verified that the addressee is in fact wed.

The Long and Short of “I Heard You’re Married”

So in some roundabout hip-hop sort of way, on top of being a love song this track is seemingly meant to be sympathetic to women who are in loveless marriages. Such is very much a less-than-ideal romantic fate, which is one of the main points that the homeys are getting to. 

However, their solution, at least initially, is not that the addressee and her spouse should work things out, since the vocalist too is in love with her. But interesting to note is that The Weeknd eventually ends the song by coming to the conclusion that a woman who hides her marriage and then messes with another dude is just too “deceitful” for him to be romantically involved with.

Facts about “I Heard You’re Married”

“I Heard You’re Married” came out with the rest of The Weeknd’s album “Dawn FM” on 7 January 2022. And a few days later Republic Records and XO Records also issued it as the project’s third single.

Lil Wayne and The Weeknd wrote this song with Oneohtrix Point Never and Calvin Harris.

Oneohtrix Point Never is an American musician who worked with The Weeknd on his previous studio album, 2020’s “After Hours”, with Calvin Harris actually being a well-known EDM DJ from Scotland. And the three of them – Weeknd, Harris and Oneohtrix – also co-produced this track. In producing it, they worked with omnipresent Swedish behind-the-scenes’ men Oscar Holter and Max Martin.

The first teasing of this song transpired earlier in January of 2022, when The Weeknd revealed the tracklist of “Dawn FM”. 

This is the second time Weeknd has collaborated with Lil Wayne, as Abel participated on Weezy’s 2013 track “I’m Good (Dedication 5)”.