Frank Ocean may be a member of LA\u2019s often crass Odd Future collective, but his songwriting is far more mature than that of his cohorts. He plays a smooth style of R&B, more akin to the likes of Stevie Wonder and Marvin Gaye than say Prince or James Brown. His first release, 2011\u2019s Nostalgia Ultra<\/i>, was a strained effort that showed promise but featured too many outright awful ideas to resonate with me. Channel Orange<\/i>, however, is a big step up and makes me optimistic for Ocean\u2019s future.<\/p>\n
\u201cBad Religion\u201d is the album\u2019s major highlight. Its passionate lyrics about unrequited love, excellent melody, and truly passionate delivery make for Ocean\u2019s best song yet. Definite hit potential there. Other highlights include the soulful horn-laden \u201cThinkin\u2019 Bout You,\u201d the chilling drug tale \u201cCrack Rock,\u201d and the groovy \u201cSuper Rich Kids,\u201d which repurposes the beat from Elton John\u2019s\u00a0\u201cBennie And The Jets\u201d to great effect.<\/p>\n
\u201cPyramids\u201d is the big centerpiece here, taking up a fifth of the album\u2019s runtime. While it makes use of a handful of decent ideas to tell its story and carry the track though its different sections, the song lacks the momentum it needs to maintain my attention throughout its 10 minutes. It could have been edited down significantly without losing anything, but it\u2019s still nice to see Ocean trying to stretch out and break conventions like this.<\/p>\n
There is a welcome diversity of approaches here. No two songs really sound alike, but not enough is done to make each stand out melodically. Tunes such as \u201cSierra Leone,\u201d \u201cLost,\u201d \u201cPink Matter,\u201d and \u201cMonks\u201d are just dead in the water. \u201cPink Matter\u201d thankfully is saved by a guest appearance from Outkast\u2019s Andre 3000, who seems to have made it his mission to show up every single artist who will let him guest on their tracks. His verse makes for one of the best moments on the album but in the end it mainly serves to remind me how I\u2019d rather be listening to an Outkast album instead. Ocean\u2019s Odd Future buddies Earl Sweatshirt and Tyler The Creator also make guest appearances, the former with his second commercially released verse on \u201cSuper Rich Kids,\u201d and the latter on bonus track \u201cGolden Girl.\u201d Earl\u2019s delivery is a little lackluster but his wordplay is as fun as ever and it fits the song well. Tyler\u2019s verse, however, just sounds out of place on a song that wasn\u2019t that great to begin with, so it was probably a smart choice relegating it to bonus track status.<\/p>\n
The problem with this album is pretty simple. Ocean simply can\u2019t compete with his idols. His voice is good, sure, but it doesn\u2019t come close to being as expressive as some of the singers he\u2019s imitating. But he comes close in spots, particularly on \u201cBad Religion.\u201d I do feel he has the potential to be a truly great singer, but he hasn\u2019t quite reached that level yet. <\/p>\n
Channel Orang<\/i>e shows an artist growing into his own skin. This is a big leap above Nostalgia Ultra<\/i> and if Frank Ocean can continue to improve at the same rate, he could become an R&B force to be reckoned with. Most artists in this genre these days seem to just sing vapid sex and party songs, so it\u2019s refreshing to listen to an R&B artist with as much substance to his music as Ocean. However it\u2019s apparent that he still has a ways to go if he truly wants to compete with his influences. Channel Orange<\/i> is a solid record but it doesn\u2019t come close to touching any of the genre\u2019s past classics. Does Ocean have it in him or is this the best he can offer? Only time will tell. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":83,"featured_media":31053,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"artist":[8906],"rating":[5612],"class_list":["post-42737","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-frank-ocean","rating-rating-b-minus"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/42737","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/83"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=42737"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/42737\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/31053"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=42737"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=42737"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=42737"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}