Something we as listeners tend to do is build up artists in our imagination. It’s hard not to, especially when they impact us in a way that’s often intangible through their voices and music. We build them up as idols, as untouchable, as godlike figures. Music is often an escape, and building up artists like this helps us dive deeper into that diversion; to imagine an artist as someone on our level can take us out of that escape. This behavior of placing artists on a pedestal only intensifies when the artist leads a private life. And there probably isn’t a better example of an artist who leads a private life than Frank Ocean.
Four years ago, he dropped two albums within 48 hours, had one interview, performed at a handful of concerts, and dropped off the face of the planet again. He’s resurfaced for air every now and then, releasing amazing singles (“Chanel” and “Biking” are my personal favorites) but the air of mystery that surrounded him for four years prior to releasing Endless and Blonde is still very much intact. But a deeper listen of these albums, specifically Blonde, reveal an intimate, deeply personal confessional over its hour runtime. On the 4-year anniversary of a generational masterpiece, and one of my favorite albums of all time, I want to dive deep into Blonde and the rich tapestry that Frank paints for us over 17 tracks.
LISTEN: Frank Ocean – Blonde
The instant you press play on Blonde, you’re hit in the face with a woozy, hypnotic beat that lulls you into a sense of cautious calm. Rolling drums alongside seemingly fading-but-present synths welcome you to Frank Ocean’s fourth project with a warm and rich sound. Half a minute in, a modularized voice croons, “These bitches want nikes”, and it’s as if all is right in the world.
At least, that’s how it sounds nearly four years after its release and maybe my 500th play of the album. When it first came out, it premiered with a video (that has been unfortunately scrubbed from the internet), featuring cars, money, psychedelic effects, and of course, Frank Ocean. “RIP Trayvon, that n***** look just like me”, the high-pitched voice sing-raps as we look at Frank holding a framed picture of the 17-year old.
I remember that summer so vividly, and it was solely because of the lead-up to and the release of Endless and Blonde. Four years after the release of his mainstream breakout album, Channel Orange, four years full of teases and mostly silence. First came the visual album, Endless, where we watched him literally painstakingly build a staircase as gorgeous, but seemingly intentionally unfinished, songs played throughout the warehouse (but as CD-quality versions came out, Endless revealed itself to be its own kind of masterpiece). A couple of days were given to us to digest this before the main event, before the headliner that shook the music world that is Blonde released.
“Nikes” is a hell of an intro, as the highly modularized voice takes you through the first three minutes or so before a voice that is so, so familiar comes into the song, as soft guitar ripples and airy, light synths float around it. “I may be younger, but I look after you/We’re not in love, but I make love to you/When you’re not here, I’ll save some for you/I’m not him, but I mean something to you”, he sings in a slightly autotuned croon, and it’s as if Frank is singing to us in a hazy, smoke-filled bedroom, talking about a love that didn’t last.
Immediately, this first song is incredibly different than what we had known Frank for. Channel Orange was known for its vivid storytelling; a lot of the songs were about different people, different lives, different backgrounds. But Blonde is incredibly autobiographical; every song on here seems to be about a period of time in Frank’s life.
From “Nikes” we transition into what may be my favorite track on the album (although that changes every time I listen to it), “Ivy”. A sweet, saccharine guitar plays as Frank sings, manipulating his voice to make him sound younger, about a nostalgic time in his life, when he “drive to Syd’s” and “didn’t give a fuck back then”. It’s just Frank and the guitar on this song, and it’s a beautiful look into his past with passion building in each verse in his immaculate voice before he puts the filters on and screams “I’ve been dreaming”.
“Pink + White” is perhaps the most upbeat song on the whole album, with booming drums and a funky bassline before a background female voice lifts the track into pure auditory pleasure (and who is that female voice but none other than Beyonce?). A realization about the album that reveals itself upon second or third listen is the absence of drums. An R&B record with drums on less than half the tracks is unheard of, yet to call Blonde solely an R&B album is probably a misnomer. It’s genre-bending, with inspiration from indie music, church music (as evidenced by the organs heard on the gorgeous, captivating “Solo”), psychedelic pop, and hip hop.
By eschewing drums in favor of an emptier, more atmospheric soundscape, Frank subverts all expectations from what his fans might have been expecting. Channel Orange, after all, had drums galore and more or less followed the traditional structure of an R&B record. And to many, this decision was not looked upon kindly. But I think the empty spaces on the songs on Blonde create such a mood; Frank’s voice has only improved with age, and it captivates and immerses me in the experiences and emotions that Frank’s life has held up until this point.
In the rare NYTimes interview after the album’s release, Frank speaks about a concept that is present throughout the album, but can often be overlooked:
“How we experience memory sometimes, it’s not linear. We’re not telling the stories to ourselves, we know the story, we’re just seeing it in flashes overlaid.”
Blonde is a collection of memories, not a series of stories. For such a reclusive and mysterious artist like Frank, it’s incredible that Blonde takes us into his headspace in this way. Frank is inviting us to experience his life the way he sees them: not from a storytelling perspective but from his perspective, the way he remembers these people and relationships and times in his life. It’s an exceptionally rare thing for an artist to pull off, even in such a personal and intimate medium such as music. When we experience memories in our own head, we don’t see it as linear; it’s flashes of conversations, of places we’ve been, of things we were doing. This comes across in spades on Blonde, in both the music and the lyrics, and it’s an exceptional accomplishment that Frank seems to pull off with effortless confidence.
There are so many songs that exemplify this idea on Blonde, like “Self Control”, a song that features some of Frank’s best lyricism to date. “Wish I was there/Wish we’d grown up on the same advice/And our time was right”, he sings over nothing but a simple guitar riff, but the emotion in his voice is unmistakable. It’s a transportive song that will get you thinking about those wistful times in your adolescence, and as it builds with a stunning swell of strings, the song elevates itself from great to simply breathtaking. “I, I, I know you gotta leave, leave, leave,” Frank achingly sings. He knows how to use nostalgia with beautiful and often devastating efficacy.
The album’s centerpiece, “Nights” is a tour-de-force that showcases the entire experience of Blonde in a nearly six minute song. Energetic guitar strums followed by powerful kick drums as Frank sings in a frenetic fervor, “This feel like a quaalude/No sleep in my body”, and the song transforms, with the guitar strums fading out and replaced by distortion and sizzling synth lines before the drums disappear and Frank takes us through a bridge, and the song seemingly builds towards a climax. A grungy guitar takes us on an anxious journey before it drops out and we’re greeted with reversed drums and yet another manipulated Frank voice, as the real Frank voice ad-libs in the background. A haunting and massive bassline fills the track. “Staying with you when I didn’t have an address/Fucking on you when I didn’t own a mattress”, he raps, before he talks about his insularity. “Shut the fuck up, I don’t want your conversation/Rolling marijuana, that’s a cheap vacation”.
I could go on and on about each and every song on Blonde. Andre 3000’s Drake-shattering guest verse; the dissonant strings, the frantic drums, and angelic child choir on “Pretty Sweet”; the achingly simple but beautiful atmosphere on “White Ferrari”; the anxious, gorgeous orchestral arrangement (helped by none other than Radiohead’s Jonny Greenwood) on “Siegfried” as Frank sings about courage, or lack thereof, in growing old and mortality. But I believe the aspect that makes Blonde so special is the atmospheric experience it creates for its listeners. From the rich, nostalgia-drenched production of each track to the autobiographical, emotional lyrics, Frank captivates the listener for the album’s full sixty minutes and eight seconds. He’s letting us in on how he revisits his life; it’s instantly relatable as we think of those powerful memories that tend to come to us when we’re alone and it’s late at night.
It’s an immersive album that, in my opinion, is best listened to front to back. Devote an hour of your time to listen to the album with headphones, and let Frank take you into his mind and psyche. Much of the songs confront loneliness, like on “Solo” where he talks about what is, essentially, him being ghosted (if only all of us could spin poetic about those unfortunate occurrences). But that loneliness seems to resolve itself for Frank, as his voice never quavers or never loses confidence. It’s as if Frank is coming to terms with being lonely on this album, and telling us that it’s okay as well. Videos of him performing songs from this album live feature him in noise-canceling headphones, and he doesn’t really seem to ever look at the audience, often turning his back on them as he sings. He’s performed less than five times since the release of this album, a fact that saddens me deeply, but it’s obvious that the artist cares about crafting experiences that will resonate with his audience, be it live or recorded.
The last song on this album, “Futura Free”, has been in my rotation for the past couple of weeks after the tragic news of Frank’s younger brother, Ryan, passing away earlier this month. The last half of the 9-minute song is a spliced up interview from seemingly years ago, and it prominently features Ryan talking about his wishes and dreams. This news makes the track hit even harder upon listening; Frank’s love for his little brother was well chronicled, and for an album as deliberately constructed as Blonde to feature this interview means that it meant something to Frank.
The first verse of the song tackles the idolization of Frank as an artist, and attempts to bring him down from the pedestal that we’ve put him on. He starts by addressing where he’s come from, and the stunning rise to success he’s faced:
“I used to work on my feet for 7 dollars a hour
Call my Momma like, “Momma
I ain’t making minimum wage, Momma
I’m on, Momma, I’m on
Now I’m making 400, 600, 800K, Momma
To stand on my feet, Momma”
He sings in a heavily affected voice, childlike, seemingly to signify that he feels in over his head.
“Play these songs, it’s therapy, Momma
They paying me, Momma
I should be paying them
I should be paying y’all, honest to God
I’m just a guy, I’m not a god
Sometimes I feel like I’m a god, but I’m not a god
If I was I don’t know which heaven would have me, Momma”
Over the previous 16 tracks, Frank never let us know how he felt about his fame, his fans, his success; it’s been autobiographical about everything but this aspect of his life. But to end the album on this song is such a powerful statement. We’ve spent the better part of the last hour building him up in our head, as he’s spun poetic over gorgeous music about his adolescence, past lovers, and life experiences without acknowledging the burden that comes with fame. And then “Futura Free” hits, with its gloomy chords over a soft drum beat that evoke strong nostalgia, a feeling that Frank loves to ruminate on. He brings himself down, talking about the godlike projections that have been put onto him and his internal struggle with that expectation. “Please gimme immortality/I’m going rapidly, fading drastically,” Frank sings, worried about his place in the world and the future.
But then Frank contradicts himself, as the third verse comes in and his voice starts to sound like the Frank we’ve heard over the course of the record (albeit still a little modularized).
“I ain’t on your schedule
I ain’t on no schedule
I ain’t had me a job since 2009
I ain’t on no sales floor”
The song shifts from wavering doubts and unease about his success to defiant confidence and acknowledgment of Frank’s accomplishments; it’s a victory lap. He addresses the fervor that picked up from fans as he refused to drop music and tells us that he’s on no schedule, and he’ll release music when he feels like it (when it’s as good as Blonde, he’s allowed himself that). The beat picks up, and Frank talks about knowing his net worth and the cars that he’s accumulated over the years. From making 7 dollars an hour to making millions per year, Frank is looking back on the path that he’s taken with an almost smug outlook.
But given the earlier part of the song, it’s a paradox, and it’s such an interesting, intriguing way to end the album. It’s his last chance to say something in the world that he’s created with Blonde, and he chooses to spend it by breaking himself down, taking himself off of that pedestal, before swiftly saying “fuck it” and putting himself back up on it. He deserves it.
And then the choppy, lo-fi interview comes in, with the looping music that plays in the skits “Be Yourself” and “Facebook Story” coming in. Frank does a 180, and takes us back years, making us listen to almost indiscernible voices amongst loud street noise and overpowering static. It’s a confusing choice, but given the first two parts of the song, where he takes us through his feelings of unease and newfound success and the confidence that comes with it, it feels like Frank is trying to show us the ephemeral feeling of time in our life and how it passes. Ephemerality is consistent on the project, through both the lyrics and relatively sparse instrumentation. It’s a feeling that Frank creates, and it’s almost as if he’s acknowledging that his fame, success, artistry is ephemeral & fleeting too. This life won’t last, but thankfully Frank lets us enjoy it while it’s here.