On Friday, Ocean released another longform piece of music called Endless, a 45-minute, 18-track “visual album” which takes a freeform approach to songwriting, and which the Guardian described as “brilliantly confounding”.
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But on Thursday night, Ocean resumed streaming the mysterious black-and-white film on his web site which shows him busy doing woodwork in a warehouse, and eventually building a (metaphorical?) staircase. “He released my complete original track as the end of this fantastic album”.
Frank Ocean appears to be making up for lost time after several pump fakes and false starts regarding the release of his sophomore album. Additionally, Boys Don’t Cry features exclusive photos, personal essays penned by Frank, as well as lengthy interviews with Kanye West, which discusses the collaboration process on his latest LP, The Life of Pablo.
His new visual stream features the likes of Jonny Greenwood of Radiohead, James Blake, Jazmine Sullivan, Sampha and Arca. He’s been teasing new music for over a year now, and Channel Orange producer Malay Ho recently addressed the holdup in a Reddit AMA.
One of the poems in the magazine written by Ocean is called boyfriends.
Among the songs debuted on the livestream is a studio version of Ocean’s cover of ‘At Your Best (You Are Love)’, originally performed by The Isley Brothers and famously covered by Aaliyah.
An Apple Music rep told Pitchfork to “keep an eye out this weekend for more from Frank”.
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His first single, “Nikes” is a visual smorgasbord paying homage to Trayvon Martin, whom Ocean sings, “looks like me”. Rolling Stone claims to have confirmed that Endless is indeed different from his new album, previously titled Boys Don’t Cry.
