Jared Lawrence
  Staff Writer

Much has been said of Frank Ocean’s long-awaited second studio album, “Blonde”. Four years ago, “Channel Orange” dropped and, no cliches intended, changed the game. In a way, he made R&B romantic again. The genre had fallen into this rut of heavy-handed, heteronormative love stories. Fans of R&B were stuck with Usher,Trey Songz and Chris Brown awkwardly crooning into vocoders,the mechanism that makes the noises one associates with autotune happen, about hanging out in nightclubs and unprotected sex with random women.

Many reviewers felt as though “Blonde” was rushed, if the product of a four year long wait can be rushed. Critics also say that it was only released to appease Frank’s fans, not because he wanted to release new music. Some, myself included, will say that his album isn’t necessarily better, but that it sounds more mature, that it’s more of a natural progression from “Channel Orange”.

His prior works, the mixtape “Nostalgia”, and  “Ultra”, and the aforementioned “Channel Orange” told a story that rang of this acceptance for kids who were living in the margins. Ocean himself is a bisexual black man whose family was displaced by Hurricane Katrina. He lives in a country that regularly opts for people with his experiences to be silenced. Due in part to his experiences, his music told of coming of age story that mainstream America had never heard nor really cared to hear before.

The progression of his works feels like a young man growing up, dealing with loss, realizing his sexuality, and becoming mature, yet colder, along the way. An underlying message in the works transforms from the acceptance and embracing and to be in touch with one’s emotions, while maintaining control and returning to guarding them. This could be possible symbolism for opening oneself to the world and retracting when it doesn’t respond in kind. Blonde feels like that stage of lonesomeness when a kid goes to college and becomes detached from their family for the first time.

On “Be Yourself” the only source of audio is a voicemail from Rosie Watson. Rosie, the mother of one of Frank’s childhood friends, warns Frank to avoid cocaine, marijuana, and, alcohol. She also tells him that weed will make him “luggish, lazy, stupid, and, unconcerned”. This more than reminds someone in college a missed call from their parents. But above all, Watson reminds Ocean to remain himself, that he doesn’t need to be like anyone else. On the surface, this interlude is very similar to “Not Just Money” from “Channel Orange”, where Rosie Watson is scolding Ocean over voicemail for his reckless spending back before he was established as an artist.

This album has a very detached feel, that is expanded on in “Solo” and “Solo (Reprise)”. In the first iteration of  “Solo”, Frank works with the various aspects of the concept of being alone, such as caring for oneself, providing one’s own food, shelter, and water. Frank is singing about being alone throughout the song but balances this with the exposure of a double meaning during the chorus that expresses that sometimes he feels “so low” that he needs to get high. “Solo (Reprise)” features a verse from the equally elusive André 3000, formerly of Outkast. This reprisal presents similar themes; but with André 3000’s rapid flow has a dizzying effect not unlike when one begins to panic under social pressure.

Overall, this album champions a feeling of solidarity for many listeners. It comes across that Ocean, a multi-millionaire recording artist who escaped poverty himself a classic representation of the American Dream, struggles with accepting what he has become. This album tells of loves lost, friendships broken, and parents disappointed. This is the most “millennial” album that I’ve ever heard. It’s a new text that reads “Sorry, I fell asleep” four years after the last response.  This album is about living, an accomplishment in and of itself. It’s a piece of work from an artist who many feared had disappeared off the face of the planet. His disappearance wasn’t dissimilar to the other reclusive, profound voices like Lauryn Hill and Dave Chappelle. The only questions I have after listening intently to this seventeen-track record, is how long until the next work or is this the last we’ve heard from Frank Ocean?