I’ll have to admit. I fell into the Frank Ocean hype — the Novacane peer pressure of this underrated yet word-of-mouth artist. And as I was tuned into DC’s 93.9 radio station, the hostess continued to speak her piece about the “channel ORANGE” phenomenon and the mysterious voice behind that album.
She raised two good points as she played Frank Ocean tracks on her show:
1.)Who is this Frank Ocean who has seemed to blow up the charts overnight?
2.)Was his ‘coming out’ letter a publicity stunt to increase his chart climbing velocity?
I have a few things to say about these two interrogative sentences. As she played “No Church In The Wild”, I began to think about the artist behind the hook of song number 1 on “Watch The Throne”. No one ever pays attention to this kid. He is such a shadow amongst these moguls. This, to me, personifies him as being humble. The hype is cool in the limelight, but Frank Ocean’s quiet musical appearances and spurts within the industry makes his mysteriousness quite intriguing.
Frank Ocean’s decision to compose a letter and post it on Tumblr was just as sensible as him composing song and putting it on “channel ORANGE”. What better way to tell your fans and the world about your most personal secret than through the mechanism that made him who he is. Frank Ocean has a way of constructing sentences, paragraphs and verses that communicate a live dream of what he feels and how he feels. A letter — genius. A publicity stunt though? Def Jam specifically stated that it was just pure coincidence. I disagree with the rumors and Def Jam. I don’t think it was a publicity stunt nor a coincidence. There is no way you can sit back and look at this humble individual and automatically confirm those types of statements (well I certainly can’t). I honestly think Frank Ocean did that because he is strongly influenced and compelled by the words in his own music. The timing was perfect. It was a prequel to “channel ORANGE” — an elaborate and beautiful demonstration of what he is and what his album stands for as a piece of art. And for those who think that his album name is referring to the sunrise color on a TV screen, you aren’t thinking deep enough….you have to see beyond the satellites.
I think listeners are fascinated, others scared. “channel ORANGE” is easy to hear, yet complex to listen to.
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