In a very short space of time Frank Ocean has gone from being the man behind the scenes of many successful tracks for established artists to being the man of the moment in the R&B world. It’s not just his smooth seductive voice and chilled beats that made him so popular. It’s not just his way with words, or his subued and instantly recognisable musical style. It’s the sheer musical variety that the New Orleans twenty-four year old has managed to squeeze onto his seventeen-track debut album, Channel Orange.
Between Start and Endm Ocean manages to infuse contemporary R&B with other genres such as jazz, electro and psychedelica, and he tops it off with appearances from fellow Odd Future member Earl Sweatshirt and André 3000 (of hip-hop duo OutKast). Pyramids is the standout track; a ten minute epic narrative of Egyptian queens which shifts between tempos before culminating in a one minute and thirty-five second fractured psychedelic guitar solo, harking back to the sound of Pink Floyd’s Dark Side Of The Moon. Pyramids is something beautiful, dark, chilled and seductive, and it’s arguably Ocean’s musical calling card.
There are underlying hints of bitter cynicism in Channel Orange – Sweet Life sounds like a hymn to those who wish to just kick back and relax, but the line “Why see the world/When you’ve got the beach?” implies a veiled ironic barb to those who are happy to dwell in sheltered ignorance. Super Rich Kids is somewhat less veiled in its barbs – however, there are still clear digs at the excessive selfishness of the obscenely rich with lines such as “Too many joyrides in Daddy’s Jaguar” and “The maids come around too much” typifying this.
Frank Ocean is someone who will undoubtedly gain a massive global following from Channel Orange, and with an upcoming tour of North America, a trip round the festivals of Europe (including V Festival and Bestival) and a spot supporting Coldplay on their European tour, Ocean will no doubt become established as a world class live performer. Channel Orange deserves to go down in the archives as a classic album, and it introduces Ocean to the world with a bang and a swagger. It’s the birth of a superstar.