''Channel Orange'' (stylized as ''channel ORANGE'') is the debut studio album by American
R&B singer-songwriter
Frank Ocean
Christopher Francis "Frank" Ocean (born Christopher Edwin Breaux; October 28, 1987), is an American singer, songwriter, and rapper. His works are noted by music critics for featuring avant-garde styles and introspective, elliptical lyrics. Ocean ...
. It was released on July 10, 2012, by
Def Jam Recordings
Def Jam Recordings (also simply known as Def Jam) is an American multinational record label owned by Universal Music Group. It is based in Manhattan, New York City, specializing predominantly in hip hop, contemporary R&B, soul and pop.
The l ...
. After releasing his mixtape ''
Nostalgia, Ultra'' the previous year, Ocean began writing new songs with
Malay, a producer and songwriter who then assisted him with recording ''Channel Orange'' at
EastWest Studios in Hollywood. Rather than rely on
samples as he had with his mixtape, Ocean wanted to approach sound and
song structure
Song structure is the arrangement of a song, and is a part of the songwriting process. It is typically sectional, which uses repeating forms in songs. Common forms include bar form, 32-bar form, verse–chorus form, ternary form, strophic form, and ...
differently on the album. Other producers who worked on the album included
Om'Mas Keith
Om'Mas Keith (born December 20, 1976), also known simply as Om'Mas, is a Grammy Award-winning record producer, musician, composer, engineer, and songwriter from Queens, New York. He has worked with Frank Ocean, Erykah Badu, John Legend, Jay-Z, Ke ...
and
Pharrell Williams
Pharrell Lanscilo Williams (; born April 5, 1973) is an American record producer, rapper, singer, and songwriter. Alongside close colleague Chad Hugo, he formed the hip hop and R&B production duo the Neptunes in the early 1990s, with whom h ...
. Its recording also featured guest appearances from
Odd Future rappers
Earl Sweatshirt
Thebe Neruda Kgositsile (born February 24, 1994), also known by his stage name Earl Sweatshirt, is an American rapper, songwriter, and record producer. Kgositsile was originally known by the moniker Sly Tendencies when he began rapping in 2008, ...
and
Tyler, the Creator
Tyler Gregory Okonma (born March 6, 1991), known professionally as Tyler, the Creator, is an American rapper and record producer. He is one of the founding members of the music collective Odd Future.
Okonma self-released his debut mixtape ' ...
, vocalist/songwriter
André 3000
André Lauren Benjamin (born May 27, 1975), better known as André 3000, is an American rapper, singer, songwriter, record producer and actor. He is best known for being a part of southern hip hop duo Outkast alongside fellow rapper Big Boi.
...
, and guitarist
John Mayer
John Clayton Mayer ( ; born October 16, 1977) is an American singer, songwriter, and guitarist. Born and raised in Fairfield County, Connecticut, Mayer attended Berklee College of Music in Boston, but left and moved to Atlanta in 1997 wit ...
.
Noted by writers as musically unconventional, ''Channel Orange'' draws on
,
pop-soul
Pop music is a genre of popular music that originated in its modern form during the mid-1950s in the United States and the United Kingdom. The terms ''popular music'' and ''pop music'' are often used interchangeably, although the former describes ...
,
jazz-funk
Jazz-funk is a subgenre of jazz music characterized by a strong back beat ( groove), electrified sounds, and an early prevalence of analog synthesizers. The integration of funk, soul, and R&B music and styles into jazz resulted in the creat ...
, and
psychedelic
Psychedelics are a subclass of hallucinogenic drugs whose primary effect is to trigger non-ordinary states of consciousness (known as psychedelic experiences or "trips").Pollan, Michael (2018). ''How to Change Your Mind: What the New Science o ...
styles, as well as nonmusical sounds such as film dialogue and
ambient noise
Background noise or ambient noise is any sound other than the sound being monitored (primary sound). Background noise is a form of noise pollution or interference. Background noise is an important concept in setting noise levels.
Background n ...
that function as interludes. Vocally, Ocean uses a free-form
flow
Flow may refer to:
Science and technology
* Fluid flow, the motion of a gas or liquid
* Flow (geomorphology), a type of mass wasting or slope movement in geomorphology
* Flow (mathematics), a group action of the real numbers on a set
* Flow (psyc ...
as well as alternating falsetto and tenor registers throughout the album. His songwriting explores themes of unrequited love, decadence,
social class
A social class is a grouping of people into a set of hierarchical social categories, the most common being the upper, middle and lower classes. Membership in a social class can for example be dependent on education, wealth, occupation, inc ...
, and drugs through the use of surrealistic imagery, conversational devices, and descriptive narratives depicting dark characters. He titled the album as a reference to the neurological phenomenon
grapheme–color synesthesia
Grapheme–color synesthesia or colored grapheme synesthesia is a form of synesthesia in which an individual's perception of numerals and letters is associated with the experience of colors. Like all forms of synesthesia, grapheme–color synesth ...
, through which he had perceived the color orange during the summer he first fell in love.
To prevent ''Channel Orange'' from
leaking
A leak is a way (usually an opening) for fluid to escape a container or fluid-containing system, such as a tank or a ship's hull, through which the contents of the container can escape or outside matter can enter the container. Leaks are usuall ...
onto the Internet, Ocean and Def Jam released the album digitally one week earlier than its publicly announced date. It was promoted with five singles, including Ocean's highest charting single "
Thinkin Bout You" (number 32 on the US
''Billboard'' Hot 100) and a supporting concert tour in July 2012. ''Channel Orange'' debuted at number two on the US
''Billboard'' 200 and sold 131,000 copies in its first week, eventually selling 621,000 copies in the US by September 2014. Critically, it was the best-reviewed album of 2012 and the year's top-ranked album in numerous critics' lists, including the American
Pazz & Jop and the British
HMV Poll of Polls. At the
2013 Grammy Awards
The 55th Annual Grammy Awards were held on February 10, 2013, at the Staples Center in Los Angeles honoring the best in music for the recording year beginning October 1, 2011 through September 30, 2012. The show was broadcast on CBS at 8 p.m. ET ...
, ''Channel Orange'' was nominated for
Album of the Year Album of the Year, often abbreviated to AOTY, may refer to:
Awards
* ARIA Award for Album of the Year, Australia
* Brit Award for British Album of the Year, UK
* Grammy Award for Album of the Year, US
* Juno Award for Album of the Year, CA
* Lati ...
and won
Best Urban Contemporary Album
The Grammy Award for Best Progressive R&B Album is an honor presented at the Grammy Awards to recording artists for quality works on albums in the urban contemporary subgenre within the R&B field. Honors in several categories are presented at t ...
. Since then, it has featured in several professional lists ranking the best albums from the 2010s as well as all time.
Background
Frustrated with
Def Jam Recordings
Def Jam Recordings (also simply known as Def Jam) is an American multinational record label owned by Universal Music Group. It is based in Manhattan, New York City, specializing predominantly in hip hop, contemporary R&B, soul and pop.
The l ...
' inactivity in his recording career,
Frank Ocean
Christopher Francis "Frank" Ocean (born Christopher Edwin Breaux; October 28, 1987), is an American singer, songwriter, and rapper. His works are noted by music critics for featuring avant-garde styles and introspective, elliptical lyrics. Ocean ...
released his debut mixtape ''
Nostalgia, Ultra'' online for free in February 2011.
It showcased the singer's original tracks, repurposed songs by other recording acts,
and featured musical and lyrical elements unconventional in
R&B.
Although it lacked conventional promotion, the mixtape attained a following among listeners and received critical acclaim.
Ocean and Def Jam eventually mended their relationship,
and while a planned contracted edition of ''Nostalgia, Ultra'' never materialized, the label released two of its songs as singles, including the
''Billboard'' charting "
Novacane".
An agreement was then reached to release a tentative follow-up album for 2012.
Writing
Ocean started writing songs for ''Channel Orange'' in February 2011 with songwriter and producer
Malay, his friend and creative partner since their start in the music industry as songwriters.
They originally met in Atlanta and worked for the same publishing company, through which they reconnected after Malay moved to Los Angeles.
Ocean spent more time with Malay, introducing him to his Odd Future collective, while connecting creatively through their respective songwriting, which led to their partnership for ''Channel Orange''.
For the album, Ocean wrote his lyrics to complement Malay's ideas for the music.
Occasionally, they wrote songs together by improvising musical ideas from Malay's keyboard and guitar playing.
''Channel Orange'' was written in two weeks, according to the singer.
Although Ocean had
creative freedom for both projects, he felt more confident as a songwriter for ''Channel Orange'' and typed his lyrics on a laptop rather than composing in his head as he had done for ''Nostalgia, Ultra''.
Since transitioning from writing for other artists, he had been influenced by his "gloriously painful love life" when writing songs.
For his lyrics, Ocean used both his past personal experiences and imagination to compose narratives for songs.
He was inspired to write the song "Crack Rock" by stories he heard sitting in on
Narcotics Anonymous
Narcotics Anonymous (NA), founded in 1953, describes itself as a "nonprofit fellowship or society of men and women for whom drugs had become a major problem." Narcotics Anonymous uses a 12-step model developed for people with varied subst ...
and
Alcoholics Anonymous
Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) is an international mutual aid fellowship of alcoholics dedicated to abstinence-based recovery from alcoholism through its spiritually-inclined Twelve Step program. Following its Twelve Traditions, AA is non-professi ...
groups mentored by his grandfather, who also dealt with substance abuse in his youth.
In an interview for ''
The Guardian
''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers '' The Observer'' and '' The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the ...
'', Ocean expressed uncertainty about his penchant for darker subject matter, but speculated that "those were the colours I had to work with on those days. ... I mean, 'experience' is an interesting word. I just bear witness."
In June 2012,
news outlets and music journalists from pre-release listening events for ''Channel Orange'' raised questions about certain songs' lyrics and Ocean's sexuality.
The lyrics addressed a male object of love and deviated from the heterosexual perspective of his past songs.
Scrapping his original plan of including it in the album's liner notes,
Ocean published a
TextEdit
TextEdit is an open-source word processor and text editor, first featured in NeXT's NeXTSTEP and OPENSTEP. It is now distributed with macOS since Apple Inc.'s acquisition of NeXT, and available as a GNUstep application for other Unix-like ope ...
file as an
open letter
An open letter is a letter that is intended to be read by a wide audience, or a letter intended for an individual, but that is nonetheless widely distributed intentionally.
Open letters usually take the form of a letter addressed to an indiv ...
through his
Tumblr
Tumblr (stylized as tumblr; pronounced "tumbler") is an American microblogging and social networking website founded by David Karp in 2007 and currently owned by Automattic. The service allows users to post multimedia and other content to ...
blog on July 4.
Originally written in December 2011, it recounted his unrequited feelings for a man when he was 19 years old, citing the experience as his first love.
Ocean's disclosure was received with support from Def Jam and praise from other recording artists and cultural commentators.
He also remarked on writing ''Channel Orange'' after years of emotional struggle with the experience, stating in the letter, "I wrote to keep myself busy and sane. I wanted to create worlds that were rosier than mine. I tried to channel overwhelming emotions."
During their writing sessions, Malay noticed Ocean's use of
gender pronouns in his lyrics, but attributed it to Ocean's poetic license rather than his sexuality.
In an interview after Ocean's open letter, Malay called him "the new hybrid of what an
MC used to be in the '80s or '90s ... the true storyteller" and said of the lyrics, "I don't think anyone during any given point during the creative process knew what was happening ... when he's singing maybe from a female perspective or whatever, it's a story, it's a world that he created. It's not necessarily his personal—like something that he's experiencing. Maybe it is and it's a metaphor the way he did it".
They finished writing ''Channel Orange'' in two to three months.
Ocean said of the album's development in an interview for ''
Rap-Up
''Rap-Up'' is a magazine launched in 2001 by founder Devin Lazerine. The publication was originally a website devoted to hip hop, until Lazerine decided to pitch the possibility of a magazine to several publishers. The magazine is focused on the ...
'', "It succinctly defines me as an artist for where I am right now and that was the aim. It's about the stories. If I write 14 stories that I love, then the next step is to get the environment of music around it to best envelop the story and all kinds of sonic goodness."
Recording and production
Once the songs were written, Ocean ordered them into what ultimately became the album's track listing and began recording them in that order.
He recorded most of the album at
EastWest Studios in Hollywood, near where he was renting a home at the time.
The studio complex featured recording equipment from the 1960s.
Other recording locations included
Henson Recording Studios
The Jim Henson Company Lot, formerly A&M Studios, is a studio property located just south of the southeast corner of North La Brea Avenue and Sunset Boulevard in Hollywood. Originally established by film star Charlie Chaplin, the property served ...
and the
Record Plant
The Record Plant is a recording studio established in New York City in 1968 and currently operating in Los Angeles, California. Known for innovations in the recording artists' workspace, it has produced highly influential albums, including Blo ...
in Hollywood,
Westlake Recording Studios
Westlake Recording Studios is a music recording studio in West Hollywood, California.
History
Westlake Recording Studios was founded in the early 1970s by the American audio engineer Tom Hidley under the name Westlake Audio. Hidley was experienc ...
and Studio for the Talented and Gifted in Los Angeles, Manhattan Sound Recording in New York City, and San Ysidro in Beverly Hills.
He originally planned to rent recording equipment and the Beverly Hills mansion alone rather than rent a studio for $1,600 a day.
He had a maid at the mansion and enjoyed amenities such as a pool and a sauna, but ended up recording only three songs there—"
Lost
Lost may refer to getting lost, or to:
Geography
* Lost, Aberdeenshire, a hamlet in Scotland
*Lake Okeechobee Scenic Trail, or LOST, a hiking and cycling trail in Florida, US
History
*Abbreviation of lost work, any work which is known to have bee ...
", "
Pyramids
A pyramid (from el, πυραμίς ') is a structure whose outer surfaces are triangular and converge to a single step at the top, making the shape roughly a pyramid in the geometric sense. The base of a pyramid can be trilateral, quadrilate ...
", and "Analog 2", a collaboration with fellow
Odd Future member
Tyler, the Creator
Tyler Gregory Okonma (born March 6, 1991), known professionally as Tyler, the Creator, is an American rapper and record producer. He is one of the founding members of the music collective Odd Future.
Okonma self-released his debut mixtape ' ...
.
Ocean recorded his vocals alone for several months, striving intensively for high performance standards, before rejoining Malay for the album's production.
Ocean produced most of ''Channel Orange'' and was assisted by Malay,
who also played guitar, bass, keyboards, and brass instruments.
He described his own contributions as "behind the scenes" to Ocean's "diligent" work ethic.
Ocean wanted to experiment sonically and approach
song structure
Song structure is the arrangement of a song, and is a part of the songwriting process. It is typically sectional, which uses repeating forms in songs. Common forms include bar form, 32-bar form, verse–chorus form, ternary form, strophic form, and ...
differently than he had before.
For inspiration, he and Malay listened to older records to either use as musical references or set a mood at the studio, listening to music by
Stevie Wonder
Stevland Hardaway Morris ( Judkins; May 13, 1950), known professionally as Stevie Wonder, is an American singer-songwriter, who is credited as a pioneer and influence by musicians across a range of genres that include rhythm and blues, pop, s ...
,
Marvin Gaye
Marvin Pentz Gay Jr., who also spelled his surname as Gaye (April 2, 1939 – April 1, 1984), was an American singer and songwriter. He helped to shape the sound of Motown in the 1960s, first as an in-house session player and later as a solo ar ...
,
Sly and the Family Stone
Sly and the Family Stone was an American band from San Francisco. Active from 1966 to 1983, it was pivotal in the development of funk, soul, rock, and psychedelic music. Its core line-up was led by singer-songwriter, record producer, and multi ...
,
Pink Floyd
Pink Floyd are an English rock band formed in London in 1965. Gaining an early following as one of the first British psychedelic groups, they were distinguished by their extended compositions, sonic experimentation, philosophical lyrics an ...
, and
Jimi Hendrix
James Marshall "Jimi" Hendrix (born Johnny Allen Hendrix; November 27, 1942September 18, 1970) was an American guitarist, singer and songwriter. Although his mainstream career spanned only four years, he is widely regarded as one of the most ...
.
They also put up posters of Pink Floyd and
Bruce Lee
Bruce Lee (; born Lee Jun-fan, ; November 27, 1940 – July 20, 1973) was a Hong Kong and American martial artist and actor. He was the founder of Jeet Kune Do, a hybrid martial arts philosophy drawing from different combat disciplines th ...
, and projected inaudible old movies in the studio's background.
Their production also emphasized instrumentation and was a departure for Ocean after ''Nostalgia, Ultra''s reliance on
samples.
In the studio, they reworked the musical ideas from their writing sessions, incorporated live production, and ornamented their songs musically.
Ocean enlisted Los Angeles-based producer
Om'Mas Keith
Om'Mas Keith (born December 20, 1976), also known simply as Om'Mas, is a Grammy Award-winning record producer, musician, composer, engineer, and songwriter from Queens, New York. He has worked with Frank Ocean, Erykah Badu, John Legend, Jay-Z, Ke ...
to help him rework the songs. They added live drums to "Crack Rock", "Monks", and "
Sweet Life", which was originally produced as a digital track.
Originally written by Ocean for singer
Bridget Kelly, "
Thinkin Bout You" had been recorded as an early
take
A take is a single continuous recorded performance. The term is used in film and music to denote and track the stages of production.
Film
In cinematography, a take refers to each filmed "version" of a particular shot or "setup". Takes of each s ...
by him and posted on his Tumblr account in July.
Ocean and Malay's final mix of the song for the album added a strings intro.
For "Bad Religion", engineer
Jeff Ellis tried to compensate for the few string players they had by arranging seating for a large string section in EastWest's Studio 1 and using a pair of old stereo
ribbon microphone
A ribbon microphone, also known as a ribbon velocity microphone, is a type of microphone that uses a thin aluminum, duraluminum or nanofilm of electrically conductive ribbon placed between the poles of a magnet to produce a voltage by electromag ...
s to capture the sound. They sat players in different seats each time they played along with the track in order to mix all of the takes together and give the impression of a larger ensemble.
In the wake of ''Nostalgia, Ultra'', other artists took interest in Ocean and contacted him about working together, leading to collaborations on ''Channel Orange''.
He previewed songs at different stages of completion to get feedback from guest artists, some of whom he cited as his "creative heroes",
including record producer
Pharrell Williams
Pharrell Lanscilo Williams (; born April 5, 1973) is an American record producer, rapper, singer, and songwriter. Alongside close colleague Chad Hugo, he formed the hip hop and R&B production duo the Neptunes in the early 1990s, with whom h ...
,
who co-wrote and co-produced "Sweet Life" with Ocean. Ocean and Malay previewed songs to rock musician
John Mayer
John Clayton Mayer ( ; born October 16, 1977) is an American singer, songwriter, and guitarist. Born and raised in Fairfield County, Connecticut, Mayer attended Berklee College of Music in Boston, but left and moved to Atlanta in 1997 wit ...
, which inspired his guitar playing for both "Pyramids" and "White".
For the latter track, they used the instrumental of the song of the same name from Odd Future's 2012 album ''
The OF Tape Vol. 2
''The OF Tape Vol. 2'' is the debut studio album by American hip hop collective Odd Future. It was released on March 20, 2012, by Odd Future Records and RED Distribution. It serves as the sequel to their debut mixtape, ''The Odd Future Tape'' ( ...
'', recorded atmospheric instrumentation by Mayer and other musicians, and
tracked it to the original instrumental.
Ocean reached out to rappers
André 3000
André Lauren Benjamin (born May 27, 1975), better known as André 3000, is an American rapper, singer, songwriter, record producer and actor. He is best known for being a part of southern hip hop duo Outkast alongside fellow rapper Big Boi.
...
and
Big Boi
Antwan André Patton (born February 1, 1975), better known by his stage name Big Boi, is an American rapper, songwriter, record producer and actor. He is best known for being a member of the southern hip hop duo Outkast alongside André 300 ...
of hip hop duo
Outkast to appear on "Pink Matter". However, André 3000 did not want to reunite with Big Boi as a duo on another artist's album. The former ended up rapping alone and playing guitar on the song.
Ocean told him to tell any kind of story with his verse for "Pink Matter". As André 3000 recalled, "when I got the track, I just started writing to it and I was just, I'm just happy to be a part of that whole movement and his whole movement because he has become a whole 'nother kind of icon in today's age."
Ocean and Malay
mixed ''Channel Orange'' at Studio for the Talented and Gifted, and engineer
Spike Stent
Mark "Spike" Stent (born 3 August 1965) is an English record producer and mixing engineer who has worked with many international artists including Madonna, Marshmello, U2, Beyoncé, Björk, Depeche Mode, Echo & The Bunnymen, Grimes, Ed Shee ...
mixed parts of the album at The Mix Suite in Los Angeles.
It was
mastered
Mastering, a form of audio post production, is the process of preparing and transferring recorded audio from a source containing the final mix to a data storage device (the master), the source from which all copies will be produced (via meth ...
by
Vlado Meller at
Masterdisk
Masterdisk is an American multimedia company in New York, located at 8 John Walsh Boulevard in Peekskill. They provide production services such as audio mastering, vinyl cutting and enhanced CD and DVD production.
Their clients include such n ...
in New York City.
Malay said that he and Ocean focused on sonic "intricacies" such as interludes and skits on tracks when mixing the album, which he referred to as their "art project".
Ocean said that he admires "the anonymity that directors can have about their films" and explained his use of interludes on the album, saying that "the work is the work. The work is not me ... Even though it's my voice, I'm a storyteller."
Musical style
According to music journalists, ''Channel Orange'' has an unconventional musical style,
with influences from
psychedelic
Psychedelics are a subclass of hallucinogenic drugs whose primary effect is to trigger non-ordinary states of consciousness (known as psychedelic experiences or "trips").Pollan, Michael (2018). ''How to Change Your Mind: What the New Science o ...
,
pop-soul
Pop music is a genre of popular music that originated in its modern form during the mid-1950s in the United States and the United Kingdom. The terms ''popular music'' and ''pop music'' are often used interchangeably, although the former describes ...
,
jazz-funk
Jazz-funk is a subgenre of jazz music characterized by a strong back beat ( groove), electrified sounds, and an early prevalence of analog synthesizers. The integration of funk, soul, and R&B music and styles into jazz resulted in the creat ...
,
and
genres.
''
HipHopDX
''HipHopDX'' is an online magazine of hip hop music criticism and news. The website's current president and publisher is Sharath Cherian and the Head Of Content is Jerry L. Barrow. ''HipHopDX'' is the flagship publication of Cheri Media Group.
...
'' categorized it as an
alternative R&B
Alternative R&B (also referred to as alt-R&B, indie R&B, hipster R&B, dark R&B, emo R&B and left-field R&B) is a term used by music journalists to describe a stylistic alternative to contemporary R&B that began in the mid 2000s and came to pro ...
album, while Evan Rytlewski from ''
The A.V. Club'' called it a
neo soul
Neo soul (sometimes called progressive soul) is a genre of popular music. As a term, it was coined by music industry entrepreneur Kedar Massenburg during the late 1990s to market and describe a style of music that emerged from soul and con ...
record
and ''
Time Out New York''s Hank Shteamer described it as
progressive soul
Progressive soul (often shortened to prog-soul; also called black prog, black rock, and progressive R&B) is a type of African-American music that uses a progressive approach, particularly in the context of the soul and funk genres. It developed ...
.
Sputnikmusic
Sputnikmusic is an American music community website offering music criticism and music news alongside features commonly associated with wiki-style websites. The format of the website is unusual in that it includes both professional and amateur ...
's Sobhi Youssef remarked that, although its production "pull
from a spectrum of popular modern and classic influences", they are used "within the 'constraints' of R&B without any singular genre taking over the record."
Songs on the album are characterized by
electronic keyboard
An electronic keyboard, portable keyboard, or digital keyboard is an electronic musical instrument, an electronic derivative of keyboard instruments. Electronic keyboards include synthesizers, digital pianos, stage pianos, electronic organs ...
, muted percussion,
fluctuating
backing track
A backing track is an audio recording on audiotape, CD or a digital recording medium or a MIDI recording of synthesized instruments, sometimes of purely rhythmic accompaniment, often of a rhythm section or other accompaniment parts that live musi ...
s,
shifting synthesizers,
vamps, vibrant guitar,
and hazy
electronic
Electronic may refer to:
*Electronics, the science of how to control electric energy in semiconductor
* ''Electronics'' (magazine), a defunct American trade journal
*Electronic storage, the storage of data using an electronic device
*Electronic co ...
effects such as
dub reverb.
''
Tiny Mix Tapes
''Tiny Mix Tapes'' (also ''TMT'' or ''tinymixtapes'') is an online music and film webzine that focuses primarily on new music and related news. In addition to its reviews, it is noted for its subversive, political, and sometimes surreal news, ...
'' wrote that first half's "spacious" production recalls the "electric soul influence" of
Shuggie Otis
Johnny Shuggie Otis (born Johnny Alexander Veliotes, Jr.; November 30, 1953) is an American singer-songwriter, recording artist, and multi-instrumentalist.
Otis's composition " Strawberry Letter 23" (as recorded by The Brothers Johnson) toppe ...
,
while
Jody Rosen
Jody Rosen (born June 21, 1969 in New York City) is an American journalist and author. He is a contributing writer for ''The New York Times Magazine''.
Career Journalism
Rosen served as critic-at-large for '' T: The New York Times Style Magaz ...
observed "
chord changes
In a musical composition, a chord progression or harmonic progression (informally chord changes, used as a plural) is a succession of chords. Chord progressions are the foundation of harmony in Western musical tradition from the common practice ...
straight out of
tevieWonder's ''
Innervisions
''Innervisions'' is the sixteenth studio album by American singer, songwriter, and musician Stevie Wonder, released on August 3, 1973, by Tamla, a subsidiary of Motown Records. A landmark recording of Wonder's "classic period", the album has bee ...
'', airy vamps that nod to
arvinGaye's ''
Here, My Dear'',
ndsnarling guitars that recall
Prince
A prince is a male ruler (ranked below a king, grand prince, and grand duke) or a male member of a monarch's or former monarch's family. ''Prince'' is also a title of nobility (often highest), often hereditary, in some European states. ...
's ''
Purple Rain''".
Chris Richards of ''
The Washington Post
''The Washington Post'' (also known as the ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'') is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C. It is the most widely circulated newspaper within the Washington metropolitan area and has a large n ...
'' compared its melodic sensibilities to those of Gaye and Wonder, and its loose song structures to those of
D'Angelo
Michael Eugene Archer (born February 11, 1974), better known by his stage name D'Angelo (), is an American singer, songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, and record producer. He first garnered attention after co-producing the single "U Will Know" ...
,
Maxwell
Maxwell may refer to:
People
* Maxwell (surname), including a list of people and fictional characters with the name
** James Clerk Maxwell, mathematician and physicist
* Justice Maxwell (disambiguation)
* Maxwell baronets, in the Baronetage of ...
, and
Erykah Badu
Erica Abi Wright (born February 26, 1971), known professionally as Erykah Badu (), is an American singer-songwriter, record producer and actress. Influenced by R&B, soul, and hip hop, Badu rose to prominence in the late 1990s when her debut al ...
.
''
Time
Time is the continued sequence of existence and event (philosophy), events that occurs in an apparently irreversible process, irreversible succession from the past, through the present, into the future. It is a component quantity of various me ...
'' magazine's Melissa Locker noted melodramatic elements such as "haunting melodies" similar to
The-Dream
Terius Youngdell Nash (born September 20, 1977), better known by his stage name The-Dream, is an American singer, songwriter, and record producer. His co-writing credits include songs with "Me Against the Music" (2003) for Britney Spears, " Rid ...
's 2007 album ''
Love/Hate''.
Less melodic and
hook
A hook is a tool consisting of a length of material, typically metal, that contains a portion that is curved or indented, such that it can be used to grab onto, connect, or otherwise attach itself onto another object. In a number of uses, one e ...
-oriented than ''Nostalgia, Ultra'',
''Channel Orange'' features subtle melodies and
articulation, spatial arrangements,
and mid-tempo
drum beats,
although the more ruminative songs feature slower tempos.
Robert Christgau
Robert Thomas Christgau ( ; born April 18, 1942) is an American music journalist and essayist. Among the most well-known and influential music critics, he began his career in the late 1960s as one of the earliest professional rock critics and ...
asserted that, without its predecessor's reliance on samples, "Ocean resists making a show of himself—resists the dope hook, the smart tempo, the transcendent falsetto itself."
Ocean, a
baritone
A baritone is a type of classical male singing voice whose vocal range lies between the bass and the tenor voice-types. The term originates from the Greek (), meaning "heavy sounding". Composers typically write music for this voice in the ...
, sings with casually expressive vocals,
free-form flow,
conversational
crooning
Crooner is a term used to describe primarily male singers who performed using a smooth style made possible by better microphones which picked up quieter sounds and a wider range of frequencies, allowing the singer to access a more dynamic range ...
,
and alternating falsetto and
tenor
A tenor is a type of classical male singing voice whose vocal range lies between the countertenor and baritone voice types. It is the highest male chest voice type. The tenor's vocal range extends up to C5. The low extreme for tenors is wide ...
registers.
Similar to ''Nostalgia, Ultra'',
''Channel Orange'' has interludes that feature sounds of
organs, waves,
tape decks,
car doors,
channel surfing
Channel surfing (also known as channel hopping or zapping) is the practice of quickly scanning through different television channels or radio frequencies to find something interesting to watch or listen to. Modern viewers, who may have cable ...
,
white noise
In signal processing, white noise is a random signal having equal intensity at different frequencies, giving it a constant power spectral density. The term is used, with this or similar meanings, in many scientific and technical disciplines ...
,
and dialogue.
They exhibit an analog sound quality, and some end abruptly.
Writers interpret them to represent the limited attention span of listeners,
moments in Ocean's life,
the distortion inside his mind,
nostalgic ephemera,
or a synesthesia-inspired theme.
Jesse Cataldo of ''
Slant Magazine
''Slant Magazine'' is an American online publication that features reviews of movies, music, TV, DVDs, theater, and video games, as well as interviews with actors, directors, and musicians. The site covers various film festivals like the New Yo ...
'' viewed that the segues, along with the other songs' disparate lengths, give the album the feel of a mixtape.
According to Hayley Louise Brown from ''
Clash'', the songs are "interwoven by the
ambient noise
Background noise or ambient noise is any sound other than the sound being monitored (primary sound). Background noise is a form of noise pollution or interference. Background noise is an important concept in setting noise levels.
Background n ...
of
middle America – video games, TV commercials, aeroplanes and car doors".
Lyrics and themes
''Channel Orange'' has themes of
unrequited love
Unrequited love or one-sided love is love that is not openly reciprocated or understood as such by the beloved. The beloved may not be aware of the admirer's deep and pure affection, or may consciously reject it. The Merriam Webster Online Dict ...
,
sex,
and
existential
Existentialism ( ) is a form of philosophical inquiry that explores the problem of human existence and centers on human thinking, feeling, and acting. Existentialist thinkers frequently explore issues related to the meaning, purpose, and valu ...
longing.
Allusions to Ocean's own experience with unrequited love are featured in several songs, including "Thinkin Bout You", "Bad Religion", and "Forrest Gump".
Jon Caramanica of ''
The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
'' found the album to be "rife with the sting of unrequited love, both on the receiving and inflicting ends", with "lovers who tantalize but remain at arm's length."
Ryan Dombal from ''
Pitchfork
A pitchfork (also a hay fork) is an agricultural tool with a long handle and two to five tines used to lift and pitch or throw loose material, such as hay, straw, manure, or leaves.
The term is also applied colloquially, but inaccurately, to ...
'' said Ocean exhibits "a timeless philosophy ... one of hard-won acceptance and the acknowledgement that love and sex and loss will always draw legends to them."
The album also explores decadence,
the trappings of
class disparity,
drug dependency
Substance dependence, also known as drug dependence, is a biopsychological situation whereby an individual's functionality is dependent on the necessitated re-consumption of a psychoactive substance because of an adaptive state that has develope ...
,
and the tension between spirituality and secularity, a prevalent theme in
soul music
Soul music is a popular music genre that originated in the African American community throughout the United States in the late 1950s and early 1960s. It has its roots in African-American gospel music and rhythm and blues. Soul music became ...
.
Music journalist
Sasha Frere-Jones
Alexander Roger Wallace "Sasha" Frere-Jones (né Jones; born 1967) is an American writer, music critic, and musician. He has written for ''Pretty Decorating'', '' ego trip'', ''Hit It And Quit It'', ''Mean'', '' Slant'', ''The New York Post'', '' ...
noted "a combination of decadence and spiritual ache similar to Prince's".
Greg Kot
Greg Kot (born March 3, 1957) is an American music journalist and author. From 1990 until 2020, Kot was the rock music critic at the '' Chicago Tribune'', where he covered popular music and reported on music-related social, political and busine ...
wrote that Ocean presents "a dialogue between his self-gratifying lust and more selfless conscience", with Prince-like "psychedelic-gospel inflections" and Marvin Gaye-like
overdubbing
Overdubbing (also known as layering) is a technique used in audio recording in which audio tracks that have been pre-recorded are then played back and monitored, while simultaneously recording new, doubled, or augmented tracks onto one or more av ...
of Ocean's vocals, which give the impression of voices in conversation with one another.
Jason Lipshutz of ''
Billboard
A billboard (also called a hoarding in the UK and many other parts of the world) is a large outdoor advertising structure (a billing board), typically found in high-traffic areas such as alongside busy roads. Billboards present large adverti ...
'' viewed that Ocean examines love in the context of money, drugs, and sex.
Ocean's songwriting uses descriptive narratives,
dense
metre
The metre ( British spelling) or meter ( American spelling; see spelling differences) (from the French unit , from the Greek noun , "measure"), symbol m, is the primary unit of length in the International System of Units (SI), though its pre ...
,
surrealistic imagery, empathic sentiments,
deadpan
Deadpan, dry humour, or dry-wit humour is the deliberate display of emotional neutrality or no emotion, commonly as a form of comedic delivery to contrast with the ridiculousness or absurdity of the subject matter. The delivery is meant to be blun ...
humor,
overt metaphors,
and conversational
devices.
John Calvert of ''
The Quietus
''The Quietus'' is a British online music and pop culture magazine founded by John Doran and Luke Turner. The site is an editorially independent publication led by Doran with a group of freelance journalists and critics.
Content
''The Quietu ...
'' wrote that his lyrics treat love as "innocent", and feature "flying-as-love" metaphors and "respectful euphemisms" for sex such as a flight on a "
fighter jet
Fighter aircraft are fixed-wing military aircraft designed primarily for air-to-air combat. In military conflict, the role of fighter aircraft is to establish air superiority of the battlespace. Domination of the airspace above a battlefield ...
".
Embling of ''Tiny Mix Tapes'' regarded ''Channel Orange'' as a "songwriter's album" and views that, although "the emotions, mood, and melodies are broad enough to draw listeners in", Ocean's lyrics are "apocryphal, allowing for personal interpretations".
Ocean's narratives generally depict dark,
broken characters,
and a Southern California setting,
with references to its sunny, coastal environment in both the lyrics and melodies.
Randall Roberts of the ''
Los Angeles Times
The ''Los Angeles Times'' (abbreviated as ''LA Times'') is a daily newspaper that started publishing in Los Angeles in 1881. Based in the LA-adjacent suburb of El Segundo since 2018, it is the sixth-largest newspaper by circulation in the ...
'' categorized ''Channel Orange'' as a
concept album
A concept album is an album whose tracks hold a larger purpose or meaning collectively than they do individually. This is typically achieved through a single central narrative or theme, which can be instrumental, compositional, or lyrical. Some ...
about "the twentysomething experience in Los Angeles",
while Greg Kot interpreted the California setting to be "a state of mind in Ocean
sworld: numb, deceptively luxurious and self-satisfied, where the denizens live disconnected from one another and the world."
Songs
The opening track "Start" is a snippet of ambient sounds,
bits of silence, and flickers of noise,
including a
PlayStation
is a video gaming brand that consists of five home video game consoles, two handhelds, a media center, and a smartphone, as well as an online service and multiple magazines. The brand is produced by Sony Interactive Entertainment, a di ...
booting up.
The low-key
torch song
A torch song is a sentimental love song, typically one in which the singer laments an unrequited or lost love, either where one party is oblivious to the existence of the other, where one party has moved on, or where a romantic affair has affecte ...
"Thinkin Bout You" features soothing synth
cycles,
sparse keyboards,
muffled electronic percussion,
and lyrics addressing a lover with
white lie
A lie is an assertion that is believed to be false, typically used with the purpose of deception, deceiving or Deception, misleading someone. The practice of communicating lies is called lying. A person who communicates a lie may be termed a l ...
s in the verses and thoughts of eternal love in the chorus.
"Fertilizer" is based on
James Fauntleroy
James Edward Fauntleroy II (born May 16, 1984) is an American singer, songwriter, and record producer from Inglewood, California. He is best known for writing credits on tracks by high-profile artists such as Travis Scott, Frank Ocean, Kendrick ...
's 2010 song of the same name,
repurposed on the album as an
AM radio
AM broadcasting is radio broadcasting using amplitude modulation (AM) transmissions. It was the first method developed for making audio radio transmissions, and is still used worldwide, primarily for medium wave (also known as "AM band") transm ...
jingle and interlude about "bullshit".
"Sierra Leone" incorporates
chillwave
Chillwave (originally considered synonymous with glo-fi and hypnagogic pop) is a music microgenre that emerged in the late 2000s. It loosely emulates 1980s electropop while engaging with notions of memory and nostalgia. Common features inclu ...
and
quiet storm
Quiet storm is a radio format and genre of R&B, performed in a smooth, romantic, jazz-influenced style. It was named after the title song on Smokey Robinson's 1975 album ''A Quiet Storm''.
The radio format was pioneered in 1976 by Melvin Lin ...
styles,
wind chime
Wind chimes are a type of percussion instrument constructed from suspended tubes, rods, bells or other objects that are often made of metal or wood. The tubes or rods are suspended along with some type of weight or surface which the tubes or rods ...
sounds,
lo-fi
Lo-fi (also typeset as lofi or low-fi; short for low fidelity) is a music or production quality in which elements usually regarded as imperfections in the context of a recording or performance are present, sometimes as a deliberate choice. The ...
beats,
and
polyphony
Polyphony ( ) is a type of musical texture consisting of two or more simultaneous lines of independent melody, as opposed to a musical texture with just one voice, monophony, or a texture with one dominant melodic voice accompanied by chords, h ...
similar to Prince's 1985 song "
Paisley Park
Paisley Park Records was an American record label founded by musician Prince in 1985, which was distributed by and funded in part by Warner Bros. Records. It was started in 1985, following the success of the film and album '' Purple Rain''. T ...
".
Its lyrics address sex, conception, early parenthood,
and childhood dreams.
It recounts the narrator's lust for a girl as a teenager,
and compares their relationship to the vicissitudes of Sierra Leone such as diamonds and
civil war
A civil war or intrastate war is a war between organized groups within the same state (or country).
The aim of one side may be to take control of the country or a region, to achieve independence for a region, or to change government policies ...
.
Ocean's singing exhibits quickly descending
chord succession and is overdubbed against his spoken vocals.
"Sweet Life" and "
Super Rich Kids
"Super Rich Kids" is a song by American singer Frank Ocean featuring rap vocals from Earl Sweatshirt, and the fifth single from Ocean's debut studio album, ''Channel Orange''. It was first performed live by Ocean in 2011 and then on his Channel O ...
" depict decadent,
alluring rich people,
and are tied together by "Not Just Money", a spoken interlude with a woman discussing the importance of money on happiness.
"Super Rich Kids" references the thumping piano line of
Elton John
Sir Elton Hercules John (born Reginald Kenneth Dwight; 25 March 1947) is a British singer, pianist and composer. Commonly nicknamed the "Rocket Man" after his 1972 hit single of the same name, John has led a commercially successful career a ...
's 1973 song "
Bennie and the Jets
"Bennie and the Jets" (also titled "Benny & the Jets") is a song written by English musician Elton John and songwriter Bernie Taupin, and performed by John. The song first appeared on the ''Goodbye Yellow Brick Road'' album in 1973. "Bennie and ...
" and addresses young, wealthy characters' ennui and fears of the
financial crisis
A financial crisis is any of a broad variety of situations in which some financial assets suddenly lose a large part of their nominal value. In the 19th and early 20th centuries, many financial crises were associated with banking panics, and man ...
with dry humor.
"Pilot Jones" employs
magic realism and
escapist imagery,
and depicts an emotional dependency between drug addicts, who confuse friendship with sexual love in their support of each other.
The swooning song contains hazy electronic blips,
impressionistic
Impressionism was a 19th-century art movement characterized by relatively small, thin, yet visible brush strokes, open composition, emphasis on accurate depiction of light in its changing qualities (often accentuating the effects of the passage ...
textures, experimental
beat pattern
Conducting is the art of directing a musical performance, such as an orchestral or choral concert. It has been defined as "the art of directing the simultaneous performance of several players or singers by the use of gesture." The primary duties ...
s, refracted sound effects, and vocal improvisation expressing the narrator's "high".
"Crack Rock" depicts a
crack addict,
likens love to the highs and lows of drug use,
and broadly addresses corruption, broken homes, gun violence,
and government indifference to rising crack-related deaths.
It has fleeting multi-tracked harmonies,
a
non-sequitur chorus,
and Ocean's occasionally fractured breathiness conveying an addict's voice.
"Pyramids" is cited by writers as the album's centerpiece.
Brice Ezell from ''
PopMatters
''PopMatters'' is an international online magazine of cultural criticism that covers aspects of popular culture. ''PopMatters'' publishes reviews, interviews, and essays on cultural products and expressions in areas such as music, television, fi ...
'' wrote that it denotes "the vital midpoint of the overarching narrative", where "the wittier tone of the record's front half gives way to an emotionally dense second half."
Veering from
synth-funk
Post-disco (also called boogie, synth-funk, or electro-funk) is a term to describe an aftermath in popular music history circa 1979–1985, imprecisely beginning with an unprecedented backlash against disco music in the United States, leading to c ...
to
slow jam
A slow jam is music with rhythm and blues and soul influences. Slow jams are commonly R&B ballads or downtempo songs, and are mostly soft-sounding with heavily emotional or romantic lyrical content. The earliest known use of the term is the 1983 ...
styles,
the song has a
lyrical conceit that uses
Ancient Egyptian and
Biblical
The Bible (from Koine Greek , , 'the books') is a collection of religious texts or scriptures that are held to be sacred in Christianity, Judaism, Samaritanism, and many other religions. The Bible is an anthologya compilation of texts of a ...
imagery,
and contrasts the legendary fall of
Cleopatra
Cleopatra VII Philopator ( grc-gre, Κλεοπάτρα Φιλοπάτωρ}, "Cleopatra the father-beloved"; 69 BC10 August 30 BC) was Queen of the Ptolemaic Kingdom of Egypt from 51 to 30 BC, and its last active ruler.She was also a ...
with the circumstances of a latter-day working girl,
who dances at a
strip club
A strip club is a venue where strippers provide adult entertainment, predominantly in the form of striptease or other Erotic dancing, erotic or exotic dances. Strip clubs typically adopt a nightclub or Bar (establishment), bar style, and can also ...
called the Pyramid to support her man's gaudy aspirations.
The
new wave-styled "Lost" is about a perplexed addict,
who hopes for a better life for him and his drug-cooking girlfriend.
"Monks", a
funk rock
Funk rock is a fusion genre that mixes elements of funk and rock. James Brown and others declared that Little Richard and his mid-1950s road band, The Upsetters, were the first to put the funk in the rock and roll beat, with a biographer sta ...
song,
is about finding nirvana and deals with topics such as casual sex and devout religion in a narrative that shifts from an exciting concert to a metaphorical jungle.
"Bad Religion" features melodramatic, orchestral music and a series of
figures
Figure may refer to:
General
*A shape, drawing, depiction, or geometric configuration
*Figure (wood), wood appearance
*Figure (music), distinguished from musical motif
*Noise figure, in telecommunication
*Dance figure, an elementary dance patter ...
, including strings, handclaps, marching band snare drums,
and mournful organ chords.
The lyrics follow an emotional confession to a taxi driver by a narrator brooding over a secretive intimate relationship.
Music journalist
Alexis Petridis
Alexis Petridis ( el, Αλέξης Πετρίδης; born 13 September 1971) is a British journalist, head rock and pop critic for the UK newspaper ''The Guardian'', as well as a regular contributor to the magazine '' GQ''. In addition to his mus ...
asserted that the song "repurpos
sthe battle between religion and lust that's been at the heart of soul music since it ceded from gospel".
"Pink Matter" is a bluesy lament with themes of sex and betrayal,
as its narrator struggles between pleasure and
universal meaning.
Its lyrics allude to philosophical conundrums,
extraterrestrial life
Extraterrestrial life, colloquially referred to as alien life, is life that may occur outside Earth and which did not originate on Earth. No extraterrestrial life has yet been conclusively detected, although efforts are underway. Such life might ...
, Japanese
manga
Manga (Japanese: 漫画 ) are comics or graphic novels originating from Japan. Most manga conform to a style developed in Japan in the late 19th century, and the form has a long prehistory in earlier Japanese art. The term ''manga'' is u ...
comics,
and cotton candy.
The playful "Forrest Gump" likens the
titular film character to an adolescent
crush,
with
homoerotic
Homoeroticism is sexual attraction between members of the same sex, either male–male or female–female. The concept differs from the concept of homosexuality: it refers specifically to the desire itself, which can be temporary, whereas "homose ...
,
tongue-in-cheek
The idiom tongue-in-cheek refers to a humorous or sarcastic statement expressed in a serious manner.
History
The phrase originally expressed contempt, but by 1842 had acquired its modern meaning. Early users of the phrase include Sir Walter Scott ...
lyrics,
and allusions to scenes in the film.
It has a bright,
Motown
Motown Records is an American record label owned by the Universal Music Group. It was founded by Berry Gordy Jr. as Tamla Records on June 7, 1958, and incorporated as Motown Record Corporation on April 14, 1960. Its name, a portmanteau of ''moto ...
-inspired chorus,
a simple
rhythmic cadence
In Western musical theory, a cadence (Latin ''cadentia'', "a falling") is the end of a phrase in which the melody or harmony creates a sense of full or partial resolution, especially in music of the 16th century onwards.Don Michael Randel (19 ...
, gently strummed guitar, wistful vocals, and a perkily whistled
coda
Coda or CODA may refer to:
Arts, entertainment, and media Films
* Movie coda, a post-credits scene
* ''Coda'' (1987 film), an Australian horror film about a serial killer, made for television
*''Coda'', a 2017 American experimental film from Na ...
.
The skit "End" depicts an exchange between Ocean and a woman as they make love in the backseat of a car with his 2012 song "Voodoo" playing over the stereo. She says to him, "You're special. I wish you could see what I see", repurposing a line from the 2006 film ''
ATL'', and Ocean leaves the car in response, walks home through the rain, and sets his keys down with a sigh. The lighthearted, lovelorn "Golden Girl" has up-tempo synths, gradual
fades, and Tyler, The Creator rapping in a low-pitched, demonic voice. It is about a girl that provides salvation and peace of mind for the narrator, who likens her to an island.
Title and packaging
Ocean titled the album in reference to his experience with
grapheme–color synesthesia
Grapheme–color synesthesia or colored grapheme synesthesia is a form of synesthesia in which an individual's perception of numerals and letters is associated with the experience of colors. Like all forms of synesthesia, grapheme–color synesth ...
, a neurological phenomenon in which an individual's perception of numbers and letters is associated with the experience of colors.
He discussed the phenomenon with Pharrell Williams, who had also experienced it and similarly referenced it for the title of his side project
N.E.R.D.
N.E.R.D. (stylized as N⋆E⋆R⋆D and N.E.R.D, a backronym of No-one Ever Really Dies) is an American hip hop and rock band, formed in Virginia Beach, Virginia, in 1999. Pharrell Williams and Chad Hugo were signed by Teddy Riley to Virgin Reco ...
's 2008 album ''
Seeing Sounds
''Seeing Sounds'' is the third studio album by American alternative rock band N.E.R.D released June 10, 2008 on Star Trak Entertainment and Interscope Records in the United States. After ending their contract with Virgin Records in 2005, the band ...
''.
The title also alludes to the first time that Ocean fell in love, as it was summer and he perceived everything to be orange. Ocean's mother called it "a perfect summertime album" after attending a listening session.
According to Malay,
Kanye West
Ye ( ; born Kanye Omari West ; June 8, 1977) is an American rapper, singer, songwriter, record producer, and fashion designer.
Born in Atlanta and raised in Chicago, West gained recognition as a producer for Roc-A-Fella Records in the ea ...
helped Ocean during the album's final stages by providing "a mentorship situation" and connecting him with his "visual people".
Malay recalled how he and Ocean were "somewhat oblivious to how quickly everything happened" and Ocean's name "continuing to get bigger and bigger" as they completed the album.
To downplay himself from being "the focal point" of the album, Ocean did not want his name on the cover and had Everest, his
Bernese Mountain Dog
The Bernese Mountain Dog (german: Berner Sennenhund) is a large dog breed, one of the four breeds of Sennenhund- type dogs from Bern, Switzerland and the Swiss Alps. These dogs have roots in the Roman mastiffs. The name ''Sennenhund'' is derived ...
, credited as the executive producer instead.
The album artwork was designed by Thomas Mastorakos, Aaron Martinez, and Phil Toselli, with photography by Dave Eggar. The front cover features an orange background superimposed by the title – "channel" rendered in lower-case
Cooper Black
Cooper Black is an ultra-bold serif typeface intended for display use that was designed by Oswald Bruce Cooper and released by the Barnhart Brothers & Spindler type foundry in 1922. The typeface was drawn as an extra-bold weight of Cooper's "Coo ...
font and "orange" rendered in all upper-case
Sans-serif
In typography and lettering, a sans-serif, sans serif, gothic, or simply sans letterform is one that does not have extending features called "serifs" at the end of strokes. Sans-serif typefaces tend to have less stroke width variation than seri ...
, with the former overlaid by an image of colored spots from a camera flash.
The cover was revealed on June 23, 2012, via online media outlets. In November 2013, it was ranked at number nine on ''
Complex
Complex commonly refers to:
* Complexity, the behaviour of a system whose components interact in multiple ways so possible interactions are difficult to describe
** Complex system, a system composed of many components which may interact with each ...
'' magazine's list of "The 50 Best Pop Album Covers of the Past Five Years", with contributing journalist Dale Eisinger writing in an accompanying essay: "Ocean took a simple route with the cover … Employing the classic Cooper Black font — a staple of his Odd Future crew and hip-hop history, alike — next to a more modern, Sans-Serif font shows just how smart this dude is, looking back to the past, while clearly aware of his surroundings."
Marketing and sales
To prevent ''Channel Orange'' from
leaking
A leak is a way (usually an opening) for fluid to escape a container or fluid-containing system, such as a tank or a ship's hull, through which the contents of the container can escape or outside matter can enter the container. Leaks are usuall ...
onto the Internet, Ocean planned to release it digitally one week earlier than its publicly announced date.
He was inspired by West and
Jay-Z
Shawn Corey Carter (born December 4, 1969), known professionally as Jay-Z, is an American rapper, record producer, entrepreneur, and founder of Manhattan-based conglomerate talent and entertainment agency Roc Nation. He is regarded as one of ...
, who prevented their 2011 album ''
Watch the Throne
''Watch the Throne'' is a collaborative studio album by American rappers Jay-Z and Kanye West, collectively known as The Throne. It was released on August 8, 2011, through Roc-A-Fella Records, Roc Nation, and Def Jam Recordings. Prior to the re ...
'' from leaking by announcing several misleading release dates.
On June 8, Ocean announced a July 17 release date and released a
trailer for the album directed by
Nabil Elderkin
Nabil Elderkin is an American-born Australian film and music video director and photographer, who is of Iranian and American descent. He is mononymously credited as Nabil in his videos. Elderkin has directed videos for musical artists such as: ...
.
On July 9, he made his television debut on ''
Late Night with Jimmy Fallon
''Late Night with Jimmy Fallon'' is an American late-night talk show hosted by comedian Jimmy Fallon.[ About pag ...](_blank)
'' and performed "Bad Religion" with backing from the show's house band
The Roots
The Roots are an American hip hop band formed in 1987 by Tariq "Black Thought" Trotter and Ahmir "Questlove" Thompson in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. The Roots serve as the house band on NBC's ''The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy F ...
and a strings section. The show announced the album's actual release date and vendor,
Universal Music Group
Universal Music Group N.V. (often abbreviated as UMG and referred to as just Universal Music) is a Dutch– American multinational music corporation under Dutch law. UMG's corporate headquarters are located in Hilversum, Netherlands and its ...
,
who made it available on July 10 as a digital download on
iTunes
iTunes () is a software program that acts as a media player, media library, mobile device management utility, and the client app for the iTunes Store. Developed by Apple Inc., it is used to purchase, play, download, and organize digital mul ...
. Ocean said at the time, "I haven't even held one in my hands ... The
Dsare done, but when we sent them in, they were locked down at the manufacturer. They haven't left. They never went on trucks
o storesbecause that's where things leak."
''Channel Orange'' was sold exclusively through iTunes until July 17, when it was released to other digital retailers.
Although its wide physical release was scheduled for July 17, Universal encouraged physical retailers to start selling it immediately after they receive shipments of the album.
Retail company
Target
Target may refer to:
Physical items
* Shooting target, used in marksmanship training and various shooting sports
** Bullseye (target), the goal one for which one aims in many of these sports
** Aiming point, in field artillery, fi ...
did not approve of its early release to iTunes and chose not to stock the album. Ocean's manager Christian Clancy responded in a message on Twitter that he found it "interesting" that Target "also donates to non-equal rights organizations", suggesting their decision was influenced by Ocean's coming out. Target representatives dismissed Clancy's claims as "absolutely false" in a subsequent statement to
MTV News
MTV News is the news production division of MTV. The service is available in the US with localized versions on MTV's global network. In February 2016, MTV Networks confirmed it would refresh the MTV News brand in 2016, to compete with the likes ...
, saying that the company "supports inclusivity and diversity in every aspect of our business. Our assortment decisions are based on a number of factors, including guest demand."
In its first week of release, ''Channel Orange'' sold 131,000 copies and debuted at number two on the US
''Billboard'' 200 on July 18, 2012. The majority of its first-week sales were digital copies from iTunes, while approximately 3,000 of the sales were physical copies.
Digital copies sold for $2.99 at
Amazon
Amazon most often refers to:
* Amazons, a tribe of female warriors in Greek mythology
* Amazon rainforest, a rainforest covering most of the Amazon basin
* Amazon River, in South America
* Amazon (company), an American multinational technology c ...
were excluded from
Nielsen SoundScan
Luminate (formerly Nielsen SoundScan, Nielsen Music Products, and MRC Data) is a provider of music sales data. Established by Mike Fine and Mike Shalett in 1991, data is collected weekly and made available every Sunday (for albums sales) and eve ...
's sales data, as ''Billboard''s chart policy disqualified albums sold for less than $3.49 from charting. The album sold 54,000 copies in its second week, excluding discounted copies sold by Amazon.com, which ''Billboard'' estimated to be approximately 15,000 copies. ''Channel Orange'' also debuted at number two on the
British albums chart with first-week sales of 13,000 copies.
It was the first album to chart within the top 20 in the United Kingdom solely on digital sales. In Canada, the album debuted at number three on first-week sales of 6,700 copies.
Five singles were released from the album—"Thinkin Bout You" on April 17, 2012, "Pyramids" on June 8, "Sweet Life" on July 6,
"Lost" on December 17, and "Super Rich Kids" on March 17, 2013. "Thinkin Bout You" became Ocean's highest charting single in the US, peaking at number 32 on the
''Billboard'' Hot 100. Ocean performed the song on the
2012 MTV Video Music Awards
The 2012 MTV Video Music Awards, hosted by Kevin Hart, took place on Thursday, September 6, 2012, honoring the best music videos from the previous year. The awards were broadcast from the Staples Center arena at L.A. Live in Downtown Los Angeles. ...
on September 6, 2012. and the following week, ''Channel Orange'' sold almost 14,000 more copies. Ocean also performed "Thinkin Bout You" and "Pyramids" on ''
Saturday Night Live
''Saturday Night Live'' (often abbreviated to ''SNL'') is an American late-night live television sketch comedy and variety show created by Lorne Michaels and developed by Dick Ebersol that airs on NBC and Peacock. Michaels currently serves a ...
'' on September 15, the latter of which featured John Mayer on guitar. By September 2016, the album had sold 686,000 copies in United States.
Touring
Ocean embarked on a 14-date North American tour in July 2012 supporting the album.
Announced on June 8,
the tour had sold out by July 9. On its number of shows, Ocean explained that he wanted to provide quality over quantity and said that "it's not about let's do a million things right now. It's about let's just do our best to do the best things right now."
Malay joined him as the tour's musical director and said that it would expand on the production of Ocean's previous concerts for ''Nostalgia, Ultra''.
Their stage setup featured a guitarist, bassist, drummer, two pianos, and a DJ setup behind television monitor props, which showed ever-changing images.
Along with songs from ''Nostalgia, Ultra'' and ''Channel Orange'', Ocean performed "
Made in America", his unreleased songs "Summer Remains" and "Voodoo", and covers of Prince's "
When You Were Mine" (1980),
Beyoncé
Beyoncé Giselle Knowles-Carter ( ; born September 4, 1981) is an American singer, songwriter, and actress. Beyoncé's boundary-pushing artistry and vocals have made her the most influential female musician of the 21st century, according to ...
's "
I Miss You" (2011), and
Sade
Sade may refer to:
People
* Marquis de Sade (1740–1814), French aristocrat, writer, and libertine
* Sade (singer) (born 1959, Helen Folasade Adu), British Nigerian musician and lead singer of the eponymous band
* Sade Baderinwa (born 1969), WAB ...
's "
By Your Side" (2000).
Reviewers of the shows noted Ocean's low-key stage presence and observed crowd screams and audience members
singing-along to songs.
After his performance at the
9:30 Club in Washington, D.C., Ocean reflected on the tour and wrote on his Twitter account, "This tourlife takes some getting used to. I get to zone out and be someones hero or deviant fantasy or whatever for and some change every night though. That's special, and the women still scream in the front row."
Ocean cancelled his tour-closing show at
Saint Andrew's Hall
The Saint Andrew's Hall is a concert venue located in Detroit, Michigan. Formerly the meeting place for the Saint Andrew's Society of Detroit. The Shelter lies underneath St. Andrews Hall and hosts various live music acts and DJs. It is best kn ...
in Detroit on August 1 due to illness.
After the tour, Ocean was slated to perform at several music festivals,
including
Lollapalooza
Lollapalooza (Lolla) is an annual American four-day music festival held in Grant Park in Chicago. It originally started as a touring event in 1991 but several years later made Chicago the permanent location for the annual music festival. Musi ...
, where he headlined the second day of the festival.
During an August performance at
Øyafestivalen
Øyafestivalen is an annual Norwegian music festival held in the Tøyen Park, Oslo. It has grown quickly since its modest start in 1999 and has become one of Norway's biggest and most important music festival
The festival has previously featur ...
in Norway, Ocean lost his voice and ended his set early.
He later withdrew from his European tour dates altogether, including English rock band
Coldplay
Coldplay are a British rock band formed in London in 1997. They consist of vocalist and pianist Chris Martin, guitarist Jonny Buckland, bassist Guy Berryman, drummer Will Champion and creative director Phil Harvey. They met at University Col ...
's
Mylo Xyloto Tour
The Mylo Xyloto Tour was the fifth concert tour undertaken by British rock band Coldplay. It was announced in support of their fifth album, ''Mylo Xyloto'' (2011), and became marked by two parts: from 31 May to 31 October 2011 they made a seri ...
,
on which he would have been the opening act during the tour's European leg in August and September.
Although he did not specify his reason, Ocean issued a statement to organizers of the
Way Out West Festival
Way Out West is a three-day music festival held in Gothenburg, Sweden, during August that plays host to a variety of popular music artists mainly from the rock, electronic and hip-hop genres. The main festival is complemented with the club co ...
in Sweden, saying that "Let me start by saying I feel like an asshole right now, but a tough decision had to be made in regard to my schedule over the next months ... Sorry as fuck, I'll be back if you'll have me."
He returned to perform at the
All Tomorrow's Parties
"All Tomorrow's Parties" is a song by the Velvet Underground and Nico, written by Lou Reed and released on the group's 1967 debut studio album, ''The Velvet Underground & Nico''.
Inspiration for the song came from Reed's observation of Andy Warh ...
festival in New York City on September 21.
Critical reception
''Channel Orange'' was met with widespread critical acclaim. At
Metacritic
Metacritic is a website that review aggregator, aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted arithmetic mean, weighted average). M ...
, which assigns a
normalized rating out of 100 to reviews from professional critics, the album received an
average
In ordinary language, an average is a single number taken as representative of a list of numbers, usually the sum of the numbers divided by how many numbers are in the list (the arithmetic mean). For example, the average of the numbers 2, 3, 4, 7, ...
score of 92, based on 46 reviews.
According to the website's editor Jason Dietz, it was the "best-reviewed major album" of 2012, as well as "one of the best-reviewed albums of the past decade".
Aggregator
AnyDecentMusic?
AnyDecentMusic? is a website that collates album reviews from magazines, websites, and newspapers. Primarily focused on popular music – covering rock, pop, electronic, dance, folk, country, roots, hip-hop, R&B, and rap – albums are adjudg ...
gave it 8.9 out of 10, based on their assessment of the critical consensus.
Reviewing in July 2012 for ''
The Daily Telegraph
''The Daily Telegraph'', known online and elsewhere as ''The Telegraph'', is a national British daily broadsheet newspaper published in London by Telegraph Media Group and distributed across the United Kingdom and internationally.
It was fo ...
'',
Neil McCormick
Neil McCormick (born 31 March 1961) is a British music journalist, author and broadcaster. He has been Chief Music Critic for ''The Daily Telegraph'' since 1996, and presented a music interview show for Vintage TV in the UK, Neil McCormick's Nee ...
said Ocean has drawn on a variety of musical ideas and pushed the boundaries of the electronic, beat-driven sounds currently dominating popular music. He summarized ''Channel Orange'' as "accessible enough for broad popularity yet operating in a pioneering realm closer to the avant-garde."
The album was called "an expansive, slow-burning classic that repays patience and close attention" by Killian Fox in ''
The Observer
''The Observer'' is a British newspaper published on Sundays. It is a sister paper to ''The Guardian'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', whose parent company Guardian Media Group Limited acquired it in 1993. First published in 1791, it is the w ...
'',
while ''
musicOMH
MusicOMH (stylized as musicOMH) is a London-based online music magazine which publishes independent reviews, features and interviews from across all genres including classical, metal, rock and R&B.
History
MusicOMH was founded and launched by ...
'' critic Laurence Green described the music as "a cherry-picking of life's cacophony repainted into the most enchanting of collages".
''Slant Magazine''s Jesse Cataldo hailed it as a "mosaic work ... so textured, complex, and mature that Ocean's recent coming out feels like a footnote".
For
AllMusic
AllMusic (previously known as All Music Guide and AMG) is an American online music database. It catalogs more than three million album entries and 30 million tracks, as well as information on musicians and bands. Initiated in 1991, the databas ...
, Andy Kellman wrote that Ocean's "descriptive and subtle storytelling is taken to a higher level" than on ''Nostalgia, Ultra'',
while Mike Powell from ''
Spin
Spin or spinning most often refers to:
* Spinning (textiles), the creation of yarn or thread by twisting fibers together, traditionally by hand spinning
* Spin, the rotation of an object around a central axis
* Spin (propaganda), an intentionally b ...
'' considered his tempered singing to be a sign of "exceptional wisdom and repose".
Fellow ''Spin'' writer Barry Walters identified the album as a key release of alternative R&B, alongside others by contemporaries
Drake
Drake may refer to:
Animals
* A male duck
People and fictional characters
* Drake (surname), a list of people and fictional characters with the family name
* Drake (given name), a list of people and fictional characters with the given name
* ...
,
the Weeknd
Abel Makkonen Tesfaye (born February 16, 1990), known professionally as the Weeknd, is a Canadian singer, songwriter, record producer, and actor. Known for his sonic versatility and dark lyricism, his music explores escapism, Romance (love), ...
, and
Miguel, while adding that "Ocean's singer-songwriter candor combined with arrangements that stretch from
EDM
EDM or E-DM may refer to:
Music
* Electronic dance music
* Early Day Miners, American band
Science and technology
* Electric dipole moment
* Electrical discharge machining
* Electronic distance measurement
*Entry, Descent, and landing demonstrat ...
to
prog-rock
Progressive rock (shortened as prog rock or simply prog; sometimes conflated with art rock) is a broad genre of rock music that developed in the United Kingdom and United States through the mid- to late 1960s, peaking in the early 1970s. Init ...
and progressive soul could be the tipping point for a type of rock/R&B crossover that's taken place under different labels since Jimi Hendrix got
Experienced
Experience refers to conscious events in general, more specifically to perceptions, or to the practical knowledge and familiarity that is produced by these conscious processes. Understood as a conscious event in the widest sense, experience involv ...
." ''
State
State may refer to:
Arts, entertainment, and media Literature
* ''State Magazine'', a monthly magazine published by the U.S. Department of State
* ''The State'' (newspaper), a daily newspaper in Columbia, South Carolina, United States
* ''Our S ...
'' journalist Fintan Walsh said Ocean's lyrics capture "the modern youth" just as
Brian Wilson
Brian Douglas Wilson (born June 20, 1942) is an American musician, singer, songwriter, and record producer who co-founded the Beach Boys. Often called a genius for his novel approaches to pop composition, extraordinary musical aptitude, and m ...
's ''
Pet Sounds
''Pet Sounds'' is the 11th studio album by American rock band the Beach Boys, released on May 16, 1966, by Capitol Records. It was initially met with a lukewarm critical and commercial response in the United States, peaking at number 10 on th ...
'' album had in 1966, calling ''Channel Orange'' "a masterful, dynamic and evocative collection of conversations between his inner-self and the listener".
Some reviewers were more qualified in their praise. In ''
Rolling Stone
''Rolling Stone'' is an American monthly magazine that focuses on music, politics, and popular culture. It was founded in San Francisco, San Francisco, California, in 1967 by Jann Wenner, and the music critic Ralph J. Gleason. It was first kno ...
'',
Jody Rosen
Jody Rosen (born June 21, 1969 in New York City) is an American journalist and author. He is a contributing writer for ''The New York Times Magazine''.
Career Journalism
Rosen served as critic-at-large for '' T: The New York Times Style Magaz ...
preferred the album's more structured songs and argued that Ocean sometimes seems to be "less a songwriter than a purveyor of formless
grooves".
Priya Elan of ''
NME
''New Musical Express'' (''NME'') is a British music, film, gaming, and culture website and brand. Founded as a newspaper in 1952, with the publication being referred to as a 'rock inkie', the NME would become a magazine that ended up as a f ...
'' said the "inventive and spirited" album's music occasionally sounds overindulgent.
Writing for ''
MSN Music
''MSN Music'' was a part of MSN's web services. It delivered music news, music videos, spotlights on new music, artist information, and live performances of artists. The website also served as a digital music store from 2004 to 2008.
History
I ...
'', Robert Christgau believed Ocean's musical compositions are more consistent here than on ''Nostalgia, Ultra'' but questioned the singer's topical fascinations with the "haut-monde
demimonde
is French for "half-world". The term derives from a play called , by Alexandre Dumas , published in 1855. The play dealt with the way that prostitution at that time threatened the institution of marriage. The was the world occupied by elite me ...
", finding the lyrics less relatable and interesting.
Accolades
At the end of 2012, ''Channel Orange'' was named the year's best album by numerous publications, including the ''
Chicago Sun-Times
The ''Chicago Sun-Times'' is a daily newspaper published in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Since 2022, it is the flagship paper of Chicago Public Media, and has the second largest circulation among Chicago newspapers, after the ''Chicago T ...
'', ''
Chicago Tribune
The ''Chicago Tribune'' is a daily newspaper based in Chicago, Illinois, United States, owned by Tribune Publishing. Founded in 1847, and formerly self-styled as the "World's Greatest Newspaper" (a slogan for which WGN radio and television ar ...
'', ''Billboard'', ''
Entertainment Weekly
''Entertainment Weekly'' (sometimes abbreviated as ''EW'') is an American digital-only entertainment magazine based in New York City, published by Dotdash Meredith, that covers film, television, music, Broadway theatre, books, and popular cul ...
'', ''The Guardian'', the ''Los Angeles Times'', ''
The Sydney Morning Herald
''The Sydney Morning Herald'' (''SMH'') is a daily compact newspaper published in Sydney, New South Wales, Australia, and owned by Nine. Founded in 1831 as the ''Sydney Herald'', the ''Herald'' is the oldest continuously published newspaper ...
'', ''
Now
Now most commonly refers
to the present time.
Now, NOW, or The Now may also refer to:
Organizations
* Natal Organisation of Women, a South African women's organization
* National Organization for Women, an American feminist organization
* Now ...
'', ''
Paste'', ''PopMatters'', ''Slant Magazine'', ''Spin'', and ''The Washington Post''.
It was named "Album of the Year" in
HMV
Sunrise Records and Entertainment, trading as HMV (for His Master's Voice), is a British music and entertainment retailer, currently operating exclusively in the United Kingdom.
The first HMV-branded store was opened by the Gramophone Company ...
's
Poll of Polls, an annual survey of British journalists from national print and online publications. It was also voted the best album of 2012 in the
Pazz & Jop, an annual poll of American critics published by ''
The Village Voice
''The Village Voice'' is an American news and culture paper, known for being the country's first alternative newsweekly. Founded in 1955 by Dan Wolf, Ed Fancher, John Wilcock, and Norman Mailer, the ''Voice'' began as a platform for the crea ...
''. In an essay for the poll, the newspaper's Eric Sundermann deemed the victory unsurprising as Ocean "dominated most music discussions this past year" and had an equalizing effect on listeners of all music genres. Overall, it was the "top-ranked" album in year-end lists, according to Metacritic.
''Channel Orange'' also earned Ocean several industry awards. It won him the Album of the Year award at the
2012 Soul Train Music Awards
The 2012 Soul Train Music Awards were held at Planet Hollywood in Las Vegas, Nevada on November 25, 2012. The show was hosted by actor/comedian Cedric the Entertainer. Performers included New Edition, Miguel, Ne-Yo, Keyshia Cole, Tyrese, Elle Varn ...
and Outstanding Music Artist at the 2013
GLAAD Media Award
The GLAAD Media Award is an accolade bestowed by GLAAD to recognize and honor various branches of the media for their outstanding representations of the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) community and the issues that affect their live ...
s.
At the
2013 Grammy Awards
The 55th Annual Grammy Awards were held on February 10, 2013, at the Staples Center in Los Angeles honoring the best in music for the recording year beginning October 1, 2011 through September 30, 2012. The show was broadcast on CBS at 8 p.m. ET ...
, it garnered the singer nominations for
Album of the Year Album of the Year, often abbreviated to AOTY, may refer to:
Awards
* ARIA Award for Album of the Year, Australia
* Brit Award for British Album of the Year, UK
* Grammy Award for Album of the Year, US
* Juno Award for Album of the Year, CA
* Lati ...
,
Best New Artist
The Grammy Award for Best New Artist has been awarded since 1959. Years reflect the year in which the Grammy Awards were handed out, for records released in the previous year. The award was not presented in 1967. The official guidelines are as ...
, and
Record of the Year
The Grammy Award for Record of the Year is presented by the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences of the United States to "honor artistic achievement, technical proficiency and overall excellence in the recording industry, without reg ...
(for "Thinkin Bout You"), winning for
Best Urban Contemporary Album
The Grammy Award for Best Progressive R&B Album is an honor presented at the Grammy Awards to recording artists for quality works on albums in the urban contemporary subgenre within the R&B field. Honors in several categories are presented at t ...
. Ocean agreed to perform at the awards show only if they let him play the song he wanted,
"Forrest Gump".
Since then, ''Channel Orange'' has appeared on several decade-end and all-time critics' lists.
In 2013, it was ranked 147th on
''NME''s The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time. The following year, it was included in the book ''
1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die
''1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die'' is a musical reference book first published in 2005 by Universe Publishing. Part of the ''1001 Before You Die'' series, it compiles writings and information on albums chosen by a panel of music critics ...
''. In 2019, ''The Guardian'' ranked it 12th in a list of the 100 best albums from the 21st century, while on rankings of the 2010s' top albums, ''Uproxx'' placed it 13th and ''Pitchfork'' placed it 10th. According to Acclaimed Music, based on such lists, ''Channel Orange'' is the third most acclaimed album of the 2010s and the 66th most acclaimed album in history.
In 2020, ''Rolling Stone'' ranked the album at number 148 on the magazine's revision to the Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Albums of All Time, 500 Greatest Albums of All Time list. Two years later, they also ranked it at number 13 on their 100 Best Debut Albums of All Time list.
Track listing
Credits are adapted from the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP)
and Tidal (service), Tidal.
Notes
* "Start" features additional vocals by Raymond Buck
* "Not Just Money" features uncredited vocals by Rosie Watson
* "Pilot Jones" features additional vocals by
Om'Mas Keith
Om'Mas Keith (born December 20, 1976), also known simply as Om'Mas, is a Grammy Award-winning record producer, musician, composer, engineer, and songwriter from Queens, New York. He has worked with Frank Ocean, Erykah Badu, John Legend, Jay-Z, Ke ...
and Juliet Buck
* "Crack Rock" features additional vocals by Om'Mas Keith
* "Lost" features additional vocals by Stacy Barthe and Danielle Miranda-Simms
* "Monks" features background vocals by Lalah Hathaway
* "Forrest Gump" features additional vocals by the Alabama Crimson Tide, Crimson Tide Cheerleaders
* "Golden Girl" begins at 3:44 of track 17 in CD releases
Sample credits
* "Fertilizer" is a cover of "Fertilizer", as written and performed by
James Fauntleroy
James Edward Fauntleroy II (born May 16, 1984) is an American singer, songwriter, and record producer from Inglewood, California. He is best known for writing credits on tracks by high-profile artists such as Travis Scott, Frank Ocean, Kendrick ...
.
* "Super Rich Kids" contains an interpolation of "Real Love (Mary J. Blige song), Real Love", as written by Prince Markie Dee, Mark Morales, Audio Two, Kirk Robinson, Audio Two, Nat Robinson Jr. and Cory Rooney, Mark C. Rooney.
* "Lost" contains dialogue from the 1998 film ''Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas (film), Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas''.
* "Pink Matter" contains an audio clip from the 1985 film ''The Last Dragon''.
* "End" features a sample of "Voodoo", as written and performed by Frank Ocean; and contains dialogue from the 2006 film ''
ATL''.
Personnel
Credits are adapted from the album's liner notes.
Musicians
*
André 3000
André Lauren Benjamin (born May 27, 1975), better known as André 3000, is an American rapper, singer, songwriter, record producer and actor. He is best known for being a part of southern hip hop duo Outkast alongside fellow rapper Big Boi.
...
– guitars
* Auntie Rosie – additional vocals
* Jeff Babko – keyboards
* Stacy Barthe – additional vocals
* Juliet Buck – additional vocals
* Raymond Buck – additional vocals
* Matt Chamberlain – additional programming, drums
* Alabama Crimson Tide, Crimson Tide Cheerleaders – additional vocals
* Dave Eggar – strings
* "Football game crowd" – additional vocals
* Lalah Hathaway – additional vocals
* Charlie Hunter – bass, guitars
* David Crowder Band, Taylor Johnson – guitars
*
Om'Mas Keith
Om'Mas Keith (born December 20, 1976), also known simply as Om'Mas, is a Grammy Award-winning record producer, musician, composer, engineer, and songwriter from Queens, New York. He has worked with Frank Ocean, Erykah Badu, John Legend, Jay-Z, Ke ...
– additional vocals, keyboards
*
Malay – additional vocals, additional programming, bass, brass keyboards, guitars
*
John Mayer
John Clayton Mayer ( ; born October 16, 1977) is an American singer, songwriter, and guitarist. Born and raised in Fairfield County, Connecticut, Mayer attended Berklee College of Music in Boston, but left and moved to Atlanta in 1997 wit ...
– guitars
* Irvin Mayfield – brass
* Danielle Miranda-Simms – additional vocals
* Frank Ocean – keyboards
* Elizabeth Paige – additional vocals
* Chuck Palmer – strings
* Sara Parkins – strings
* Shea Taylor – keyboards
* Francisco Torres – brass
*
Pharrell Williams
Pharrell Lanscilo Williams (; born April 5, 1973) is an American record producer, rapper, singer, and songwriter. Alongside close colleague Chad Hugo, he formed the hip hop and R&B production duo the Neptunes in the early 1990s, with whom h ...
– additional programming, keyboards
Production
* Wil Anspach – assistant engineering
* Calvin Bailif – engineering
* Matt Brownlie – assistant engineering
* Chad Carlisle – assistant engineering
* Andrew Coleman – engineering
* Brendan Dekora – assistant engineering
*
Nabil Elderkin
Nabil Elderkin is an American-born Australian film and music video director and photographer, who is of Iranian and American descent. He is mononymously credited as Nabil in his videos. Elderkin has directed videos for musical artists such as: ...
– photography
*
Jeff Ellis – additional mixing, engineering
* Doug Fenske – engineering
* Matty Green – assistant mixing
* Adam Harr – assistant engineering
* Ghazi Hourani – assistant engineering
* Om'Mas Keith – engineering, production
* Ryan Kennedy – assistant engineering
* Miguel Lara – assistant engineering
* Peter Mack – assistant engineering
* Malay – mixing, production
* Aaron Martinez – album art
* Thomas Mastorakos – album art
*
Vlado Meller – mastering
* Paul Meyer – assistant engineering
* Frank Ocean – mixing, production
* Pharrell – production
* Mark Santangelo – assistant mastering
* Phillip Scott III – engineering
* Spike Stent, Mark "Spike" Stent – mixing
* Pat Thrall – engineering
* Phil Toselli – album art
* Marcos Tovar – engineering
* Vic Wainstein – engineering
Charts
Weekly charts
Year-end charts
Certifications
Release history
See also
* List of number-one albums in Norway
* List of Billboard number-one R&B albums of 2012, List of ''Billboard'' number-one R&B albums of 2012
* List of UK R&B Albums Chart number ones of 2012
Notes
References
Further reading
*
External links
*
*
{{Authority control
2012 debut albums
Frank Ocean albums
Def Jam Recordings albums
Island Records albums
Mercury Records albums
Universal Music Group albums
Concept albums
Neo soul albums
Grammy Award for Best Urban Contemporary Album
ITunes-exclusive releases
Soul albums by American artists
Albums produced by Frank Ocean
Albums produced by Malay (record producer)
Albums produced by Pharrell Williams
Albums produced by Sa-Ra
Albums recorded at EastWest Studios
Albums recorded at Westlake Recording Studios
Surprise albums