Heralded by the release of a video, "Nikes" lays out the album's ambitions. It's a critique of materialism with Ocean employing two distinct voices, like characters in a play, a recurring theme throughout the album and perhaps its finest sonic achievement. A party spirals out of control, the music rich but low key, a melange of organ and hovering synthesizers. Ocean uses distorting devices on his voice to add emotional texture and to enhance and sharpen the characters he briefly embodies. The upshot: They're all little slices of Ocean's personality with a role to play and they each sound distinct.
In the four years since Frank Ocean game-changing debut “Channel Orange” was released, the album’s kaleidoscopic R&B has bled into work by Miguel, the Weeknd, and Justin Bieber. Even ex-One Direction member Zayn Malik loved it so much, he hired Ocean’s producer Malay for his first solo effort “Mind of Mine.”
With so many acts trying to sound like him, it’s hardly surprising that Ocean took his sweet time in returning to the music world. But after countless delays, false dawns, out-of-control rumors, a last minute renaming, and a visual teaser album called “endless,” the follow-up “Blonde” (released on Saturday night exclusively via Apple Music) has managed to put himself ahead of the chasing pack.
