Guest Review: Nathan Roberts on Frank Ocean

A Meditation on Frank Ocean’s channel ORANGE

by Nathan Roberts

By choosing to open his album with the reassuring sound of an iPhone text alert and the original Playstation startup, Frank Ocean sets us at ease. He could have stormed in, as is wont-to-do amongst the stars of contemporary R&B, with his incredible voice and nuanced sound, but we are effortlessly ushered in before the orchestral grandeur of “Thinkin Bout You” kicks in.

Ocean sometimes wears eyewear

For a song that has been floating around online for the last year or so, “Thinkin Bout You” sums up the timeless nature of this album, it’s a song that feels as powerful on this listen as it did the first and greater still with the slight rework his major label debut has afforded to provide. Yet the music, though glamorous, never seems overstated or crass; it is full of beauty.

Despite the hyperbole that has surrounded his relatively sudden rise to fame, it would be too much to expect the pinnacle of recorded music fromchannel ORANGE, especially being his first album proper. Yet Ocean has genuinely created something exemplary of his time and place. I adore this album and so should you, regardless of its imperfections.

Throughout the album, the strongest lyrical themes deal starkly with his own life and are empathetically passionate; that love and life, strictly an individual's own experience, are so intrinsic, honest and open on this album is incredible; he has fully shared his experience with us.

Though undoubtedly possessing a voice that is unarguably timeless and soulful, hell, people think he is this generation’s Stevie Wonder, I can’t help but feel that he has also consciously grounded his music to the now; or, more probable, as a reflection of this period of his life, this time. It's personal.

And in these times of all-consuming social media, where reality and verisimilitude collide, it seems all the more important that a figurehead who is, or at least appears to be, as genuine as Frank Ocean stands ahead of the pack. He is a vocal presence on tumblr and twitter; for the cyber generation, he is one of us.

channel ORANGE stands as one of the biggest moments for the music industry this year, without shadow of a doubt. How else can it be summed up? Storming to number 2 in the charts on both sides of the Atlantic, despite only being available via iTunes, is a massive achievement.

I’d still argue that the moment Radio 1 started playing "Pyramids" in its unashamedly, and brilliantly, long nine minute and fifty six second version during daytime radio, due to listener demand, was the first sign of Frank Ocean’s, now bright, shining star. And if that apathetic outlet can bow down to this masterpiece, I don’t use the term lightly, of progressive R&B, why not you?

Nathan Roberts is currently studying English Literature & Creative Writing at Kingston University. He also has a prolific music blog and scouts for Columbia Records.

IQ AND THE POETS - ARE YOU SMART?

When you open your mouth to speak, are you smart? A funny question from a great song, but also, a good one, when it comes to poets, and poetry. We tend to have a very ambiguous view of intelligence in poetry, one that I'd say is dysfunctional. Basically, it goes like this: once you are safely dead, it no longer matters how smart you were. For instance, Auden was smarter than Yeats , but most would still say Yeats is the finer poet; Eliot is clearly highly intelligent, but how much of Larkin 's work required a high IQ? Meanwhile, poets while alive tend to be celebrated if they are deemed intelligent: Anne Carson, Geoffrey Hill , and Jorie Graham , are all, clearly, very intelligent people, aside from their work as poets. But who reads Marianne Moore now, or Robert Lowell , smart poets? Or, Pound ? How smart could Pound be with his madcap views? Less intelligent poets are often more popular. John Betjeman was not a very smart poet, per se. What do I mean by smart?

"I have crossed oceans of time to find you..."

In terms of great films about, and of, love, we have Vertigo, In The Mood for Love , and Casablanca , Doctor Zhivago , An Officer and a Gentleman , at the apex; as well as odder, more troubling versions, such as Sophie's Choice and Silence of the Lambs . I think my favourite remains Bram Stoker's Dracula , with the great immortal line "I have crossed oceans of time to find you...".

THE SWIFT REPORT 2023

I am writing this post without much enthusiasm, but with a sense of duty. This blog will be 20 years old soon, and though I rarely post here anymore, I owe it some attention. Of course in 2023, "Swift" now means one thing only, Taylor Swift, the billionaire musician. Gone are the days when I was asked if I was related to Jonathan Swift. The pre-eminent cultural Swift is now alive and TIME PERSON OF THE YEAR. There is no point in belabouring the obvious with delay: 2023 was a low-point in the low annals of human history - war, invasion, murder, in too many nations. Hate, division, the collapse of what truth is, exacerbated by advances in AI that may or may not prove apocalyptic, while global warming still seems to threaten the near-future safety of humanity. It's been deeply depressing. The world lost some wonderful poets, actors, musicians, and writers this year, as it often does. Two people I knew and admired greatly, Ian Ferrier and Kevin Higgins, poets and organise

E Y E W E A R, THE BLOG - FREEDOM MEANS BEING UNAFRAID TO WRITE WHAT YOU THINK

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