Did Frank Ocean's 'Blonde' Live Up to the Hype? GQ Editors Review
Table Of Content
So, though we didn’t have much of a say in the matter, I’m glad we waited. Because Blonde is truly beautiful, and now it has a moment of its own. Here, Frank, in a subtle way, is showing us the absurdity of labels.
Music
The first finds Frank reflecting on his life and accomplishments in a stream of consciousness style. He rambles about fame, religion, and sexuality while referencing popular icons who died at a young age such as 2Pac and Selena. “Good Guy” touches on ideas of loneliness and emptiness experienced from fruitless encounters. The track outlines a story of Frank going out on a blind date with a guy who he met through a mutual friend.
White Ferrari
That same year, Ocean began to work with the Los Angeles-based hip-hop collective Odd Future, most notably with Tyler, the Creator, who encouraged Ocean in his songwriting. Around this time, he also met producer Tricky Stewart, who helped land Ocean a contract with Def Jam as a solo artist. The following year, Ocean officially changed his name to Christopher Francis Ocean, believing that the new name would look better on magazine covers. The eventual image used on the cover is Ocean’s rendition complete with green hair — it’s the source photo on a trip. In the album cover, shot by photographer Wolfgang Tillman, we see a shot of Ocean in a bathtub, hair dyed green, with his hand covering his face. At first glance, this looks mildly contradictory to the title of the album.
Famous Musicians
This album is a demanding challenge and it has bits that could be deciphered well through December of this year. But even in the spots where Ocean leaves the audience confused, this feels like it's going to be a highly influential collection. If the chances Ocean takes on this record aren't enough, his smooth songs full of chilled, occasionally jazzy chord-progressions will be. So was Frank Ocean so pure in his artistry that he didn’t actually care about the hype that built up to a fever pitch over four long years?
In 2016, Frank Ocean released his album, “Blond(e).” Seven years later, this album has proven to be a timeless masterpiece in modern music. Although many aspects of this album contribute to the timeless nature of it, including the harmonizing vocals and bold choices of minimal soundscapes, I believe the concept of the album is what ultimately makes it a masterpiece. Namely, the concept of identity and how our modern structures are incapable of accurately expressing it. The album cover is the first glimpse we get into this theme, and is one I will explore here.
Blonde, a modern classic masterpiece
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His style choices often make headlines, but none have been as intriguing as his decision to sport green hair. I discovered that Frank was recording the conversations sometimes when something seemed interesting to him, but I didn’t know when and why exactly. We were just having discussions like anyone else, but he suddenly paid attention at this story. He maybe chose that one because this kind of story reveals something about our time. Still riding the wave of success that followed his release of nostalgia, ULTRA, Ocean began to work on a follow-up album to be released by Def Jam records, with whom he had begun to repair his relationship.
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One aspect of the album that’s been subject to much discussion is the title and its alternate spelling on the album cover. Like nostalgia ULTRA, channel ORANGE met with almost universal critical acclaim, topping music charts around the world and earning Ocean comparisons to such R&B greats as Prince and Stevie Wonder. Most notably, the album went on to win the 2013 Grammy Award for best urban contemporary album. Additionally, "No Church in the Wild," written by Jay-Z and Kanye West and featuring Ocean's vocals, won the 2013 Grammy for best rap/sung collaboration. It’s easy to intellectualize the kind of soft, deliberate music found on Blonde as romantic and deep just because it feels better than calling it boring. It’s layered, poignant, and thoughtful; even after five or six listens things are still revealing themselves.
Ocean’s use of Auto-Tune adds a layer of detachment, mirroring the emotional distance between the lovers, making it a stark reflection on the complexities of connection and isolation. Everything about the album has people talking, and the mere naming of the album has sparked much discussion among Frank’s fans. Amid the mass hysteria surrounding police brutality in Ferguson, Orlando, and other pockets across the United States, we bearly heard a peep out of Frank.
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It was so well received that it ranked first on Pitchfork’s list of the best albums of the 2010s. It was also Frank’s first number one on the US Billboard 200 and has subsequently been certified as platinum.
Skyline To, featuring a subtle appearance by Kendrick Lamar, is a standout track on Frank Ocean’s Blonde that muses on the ephemeral joys of summer fading into memory. The song’s dreamy, understated production, Ocean’s evocative lyrics and Lamar’s nuanced contributions capture the transient nature of time, love, and youth. It’s a reflective piece on the impermanence of life’s moments, underscored by the changing skyline and the realization of inevitable change. Frank Ocean’s green hair is more than just a style choice; it’s a multifaceted expression of his artistry, personal experiences, and perhaps even his activism. From its potential roots in Chromesthesia to its rich symbolic meanings, the green hair serves as a lens through which we can explore deeper layers of identity and expression.
Endless was a 45-minute-long album that intertwined the music with a video of Ocean eventually building a spiral staircase. Frank Ocean was born in Long Beach, California, on October 28, 1987. He grew up in New Orleans, but moved to Los Angeles in his late teens to pursue a career in music.
The 417 works themselves appear similarly breezy and casual, while also communicating a razor-sharp precision. Born in West Germany in 1968, Tillmans began taking pictures as an adolescent. In 1990, he moved to England for art school, and he started landing gigs for magazines like i-D, Interview and Butt to document underground club and gay scenes with his camera. “To Look Without Fear” includes celebrated images from this time, such as a double portrait of his friends Lutz and Alex sitting in a tree, appearing to wear nothing but large raincoats. The album’s title is stylized as “Blonde” on the cover but is referred to as “Blond” on Apple Music and other platforms.
In June 2012, he unveiled a new track, Pyramids, again via his Tumblr site. The following month he performed another track from the album on Late Night with Jimmy Fallon. Also in July, Ocean posted an open letter to his website, in which he revealed that he had feelings for both men and women. Many of his colleagues in the music business immediately showed their public support for his courageous decision to be open about his sexuality, although he made a point not to label his orientation.
Tillmans’ evolution throughout the 2000s and 2010s is well-captured in “To Look Without Fear.” Some of the works on display didn’t involve a camera at all, but were created by shining lasers and hand-held lights on photosensitive paper. Most images since 2008, including the Ocean portrait, were taken on a digital camera. What we have in Blonde is yet another masterpiece by the enigmatic Frank Ocean. Utterly different from Nostalgia, Ultra and Channel Orange, we experience and learn a new side of Frank.
To characterize blonde hair as either “male” or “female” puts people in boxes they might not want to accept. This is why Frank Ocean decides to dye his hair green for the cover, as to make a statement that he, and many others out there, may exist outside of these conventional labels. It all started in 2011 when Frank appeared at a Chanel fashion show wearing a buzz cut, and Vogue labelled him the coolest guy in music. Since then, Frank has worn several different variations of his signature style, dyeing his buzz cut some of the time, perhaps to add a taste of flair to his looks. Futura Free, the closing track of Frank Ocean’s Blonde, is a reflective piece that juxtaposes Ocean’s personal achievements and freedom with his reflections on fame, success, and the innocence of youth. The song’s fragmented structure, shifting from introspective verses to candid interviews, mirrors the complexities of Ocean’s journey and identity.
Its ambiguous and poetic lyrics leave its meaning open to interpretation, often resonating with listeners on a highly individual level. Be Yourself is an interlude on Frank Ocean’s Blonde that stands out for its directness and simplicity. Through a voicemail message from a mother to her son, advising against drug use and encouraging authenticity, the track serves as a poignant reminder of the pressures of conformity and societal expectations. It contrasts the album’s broader themes of identity and self-exploration, emphasizing the importance of staying true to oneself amidst external influences. Another interpretation of the album’s name is that blondes are typically carefree, and some of the songs on the album speak to Frank’s youthful carelessness. On Tumblr, Frank said that he was inspired by a picture of a blonde-haired child when he was composing the album, which again suggests that he was dealing with emotions surrounding youthfulness.
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