Frank Ocean, Channel Orange And Delayed Gratification

We’re used to getting everything we want exactly when we want it. We google the information we want and find the answers almost instantly, we expect a text back quicker than the words in them can be processed and we listen to any song on the internet that we want at the click of a button — every song except the collection we’ve dreamed up for Ocean’s highly anticipated album.

The last time that we got a new album from Ocean was the summer before my senior year of high school and it quickly became the soundtrack to every part of the up and downs of that tumultuous time of my life, it seemed like Channel Orange had a song to convey every emotion that I would feel that year. Every trip to the coast required my sister and I to blast ‘Sweet Life’ yelling the lyrics, “why see the world when you’ve got the beach?” To the afternoon that my mother, sister and I cried while listening to Frank’s falsetto on “Pink Matter” and “Bad Religion” in the car driving home from the hospital the day that my grandmother passed away. Channel Orange was there through it all and it became a personal classic for me and many other people.

Channel Orange wasn’t like the typical R&B albums we were used to; it wasn’t just about being falling in love and lust or losing love. It gave us an affirmation that we weren’t the only ones fighting internal battles to define ourselves, fighting the struggles of life or addiction whether that be a narcotic or love. It was like that sermon you hear where you just know the pastor is speaking directly to you, it was someone saying, “me too.” It was a validation that we weren’t the only ones and from then on we wanted more of that instant gratification of not feeling like we were facing these internal and external turmoils alone.

Ocean opened the doors of his life and invited us all into the struggles he was experiencing with identity, unrequited love and mistakes that he had made with each song on this album in the way that we expect most entertainers to detail and broadcast every aspect of their lives and struggles to us these days with snapchat stories, new music and interviews. But as quickly as he let us in, he ushered us right back out. We waited for new music and we were given smalls bites of what we were longing for with features on songs from Kanye, Jay-z and Beyoncé- but they weren’t enough. Once we got that taste of Channel Orange a little verse or hook wouldn’t be enough — we needed another hit, we needed another story from Frank.

I was among the many still waiting for a taste of that validation again when word dropped that Frank had posted a picture to his Tumblr holding a magazine titled ‘Boys Don’t Cry’ tagged, “#ISSUE 1 #ALBUM 3 #JULY2015 #BOYSDONTCRYMAGAZINE.” We waited for three years and to no avail July came and went with no third album in sight and we got many speculated dates throughout the year each ending with no album. We got impatient and jokes started to fly about Frank being the source of our trust issues and speculating which gone-too-soon, rap legend would drop an album before Frank.

Almost a full year after we were let down, we still crave that validation from Ocean and those cravings for another album flared up again after Ocean’s website was updated with a photo of a due date card with missed deadlines and and future deadlines. Last week, in anticipation of the album news outlets seemed to confirm that on August 5th we’d finally get out fix with an Apple Music exclusive album. That seemed to be confirmed by what appears to be a live video stream on Ocean’s website of black and white footage of Ocean first doing woodwork, welding and painting. At some points during the video stream viewers stare into an empty room for hours on end as the builder takes long breaks from their work.

But I’m not pissed at Ocean for giving us week long HGTV-esque video or for all the rumors of anticipated album drop dates. We live in a society that moves too fast and expects too much from people in the public eye and Ocean is rejecting that dogma whether intentionally or unintentionally. He’s making us slow down and to stop and appreciate the little things like features on a song or videos of woodwork and while we might do these things gripingly we’re learning delayed gratification along the way. Ocean isn’t just building what seems to be a staircase in his video, he’s helping us build patience.

We expect so much from artists now. We want them to write their own songs, do their own choreography and give us updates at every second of the day (looking at you, DJ Khaled) because we feel entitled to every aspect of their lives in this oversaturated media landscape. The fact of the matter is they don’t owe us a damn thing. If Ocean has taught his fans anything it is to be unapologetic yourself through his lyrics and with the delayed album. Greatness cannot be rushed and just because we want the album doesn’t mean it’s up to his standards yet.

I’m sure that when Frank is ready to let us back in that he will and if he doesn’t I’ve learned to be ok with that. But for now I’m patiently waiting for Boys Don’t Cry and going down the nostalgic road of Channel Orange, “ ‘till it turns from color to black and white.”