Frank Ocean cancels release of new vinyl and issues refunds

NME | Music, Film, TV, Gaming & Pop Culture News

Frank Ocean has cancelled the release of an upcoming vinyl release.

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The release, which was said to feature an unnamed new song, initially went on sale back in February.

The US singer-songwriter and producer, who was due to headline Coachella this April, first unveiled an Arca remix of his Skepta collaboration ‘Little Demon’ back in November 2019. Upon its arrival, a pre-order for a special 7″ of the track also went live.

An email sent from Ocean’s Blonded.co website at the time explained that the record will instead contain “a new, unreleased Frank Ocean song” rather than the earlier track.

Now, it appears the record has been scrapped altogether.

“Due to the events of this year, Frank will no longer be releasing the song that you purchased on vinyl,” an email sent to those who bought the vinyl said.

It went on: “We will be refunding your purchase of this item and any additional items in your order will begin shipping next week.”

Speaking about his upcoming new music and what to expect in a rare interview with W Magazine last year, Ocean said: “I’ve been interested in club, and the many different iterations of nightlife for music and songs. And so the things I look at now have a lot to do with those scenes: Detroit, Chicago, techno, house, French electronic…”

He added: “I believed for a very long time that there was strength in vulnerability, and I really don’t believe that any more. ‘Strength’ and ‘vulnerability’ sound opposite as words. And so to combine them sounds wise, but I don’t know if it is wise.

“The expectation for artists to be vulnerable and truthful is a lot, you know?—when it’s no longer a choice. Like, in order for me to satisfy expectations, there needs to be an outpouring of my heart or my experiences in a very truthful, vulnerable way. I’m more interested in lies than that. Like, give me a full motion-picture fantasy.”

In December 2018, Ocean signed a new record deal with Warner Chappell Music. Earlier last year, he revealed that he’d become interested in “toying with [the] format” of how he’d release material in the future.

“In a lot of the contracts of today with the labels, there’s an expectation to turn in a set amount of albums,” he explained. That’s really an arbitrary limitation. That’s not state-of-the-art.

In terms of evolving his sound, he cited club music as an inspiration and said he would be exploring themes of “strength and vulnerability” in his work.

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