I'm not sure what to say about Channel ORANGE. It's beautiful. It's haunting. It has songs about girls AND guys. It's incredible. All I can go by is what I'm feeling when I'm listening to a piece of music. And this album makes me feel something. This jazzy, breezy and subtly experimental album is full of smooth melodies, soft beats beautiful harmonies and some pretty intense lyrical content. Frank Ocean also has a seemingly flawless, beautiful voice that must make picking up girls easier than beating a midget in a half court game of one-on-one. There's some pretty sweet guitar riffing in there too. There's an ambiance to the whole album that just tells the listener that Frank Ocean is not playing around. He is very very serious about what he's doing. It's bold. Beautiful and bold. Now, the avant-R'n'B scene is not one I'm intimately familiar with. I'm also not an expert on music, so my views are probably questionable at best; like I said all I know is what I feel. And like I said, I feel something.
Channel ORANGE is a hip-hop record, albeit a beautiful one...but it's still a hip-hop album. There's still plenty of sex, drug references, socioeconomic commentary and some n-bombing. It's a hip-hop album after all. But it's different, and I'm sure most people now know why...
Frank Ocean, R'n'B's new golden god is bisexual apparently. Good for him. Seriously. Listening to the lyrics and melodies on his debut album, it doesn't surprise me. It doesn't bother me either. It shouldn't bother me...it shouldn't bother anyone; but I'm sure it bothers some people.
Rap music has always been mildly homophobic (and by "mildly" I of course mean "super-mega"). I can name drop at least 17 rap songs off the top of my head that slur homosexuality or allude to homosexual acts in a derogatory way, without even trying. Rap music has possessed a very juvenile attitude towards homosexuality in the past. It's almost schoolyard; "Your gay"... "NO! Your gay! And so's your dad!" This kind of exchange has permeated hip-hop beefs since the earliest days of MCing and freestyling. Calling an enemy or target "Gay" in your rap has often been seen as one of the most disrespectful labels usable. Worse than suggesting you slept with your opponents wife (think 2Pac to Biggie in Hit 'Em Up). Obviously this is wrong.
No popular male hip-hop artist has ever come out as being either gay or bisexual. We may secretly harbor suspicions about Andre 3000 or Kanye West or Vanilla Ice or whoever; it's not suspicions that matter. Orientation makes no difference to anything here. And more importantly it's really none of our business. It's not anyone's business who does what with who, save those doing the actual business in question. I guess Rap music became intensely pigeonholed in it's stereotypical masculinity and blatant homophobia for a while. Homophobic's were to hip-hop what the KKK were to the NAACP back in the '60's. This has always been an issue with hip-hop. It's not a new thing.
Amazingly though, support for Frank Ocean has seemingly been universal. Maybe this is what hip-hop's been needing for a long time. He's worked with Jay Z, so he's got the seal of approval; sorta like Moses with the burning bush and the locusts, etc. I doubt homophobia will cease to be an issue, not only in hip-hop but in society generally. Expecting homophobia to become eradicated completely is like expecting a rainless summer in Seattle, or expecting your favorite sports team to win every title available in their sport every year for the rest of forever. It's most likely not going to happen. But we can hope.
Even though homophobia still exists in Rap and in society generally, no one seems to care about this. Therefore the open letters on Tumblr and the lyrical inspiration behind Bad Religion don't make a difference. They are important, yes. They are significant to us culturally, yes; they are especially important to those of us who care about the culture of hip-hop. It is a big deal. But they don't take center stage here. The music does. The music on Channel ORANGE is the focus, and it speaks for itself.
Channel ORANGE is probably the best album I've heard all year. It's better than anything I've heard from the hip-hop world in a long time. It makes everything that other artists like Chris Brown and Usher are putting out sound like recycled garbage that's been auto-tuned and set to a club beat by the Swedish House Mafia or David Guetta. It's just a damn good album.
I've listened to Channel ORANGE twice now and I'm still blown away. To me the mark of good music is it's ability to make you feel something. I can't really relate to Frank Ocean's experiences. I've never had unrequited feelings for a man, and I've never lost my recording studio to a hurricane. But this doesn't mean that I can't enjoy the emotion that he shares with us on his songs and that I can't relate on some level to the things he's describing. I've been down, just like he has. I've had strong feelings for someone that weren't returned just like he has. I sometimes just want to party like Mr. Ocean just wants to party. The feelings I'm feeling as I listen to this masterpiece are familiar to me, because they are ordinary. He sings about ordinary things in a really beautiful way. That's why this album is so good. Because we can relate to it.
I am buying this album tomorrow so I can bump it in my car as I drive home from my job interview. I know that whether or not the interview goes well will be extremely important, but my feelings won't be; because this album will help me emote on the whole thing. I'll either want to party or sit in the back of a taxi and confess all my sins to a middle eastern cabby. Either way I'll be sorted. I take some comfort in that.
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