In 2016, Frank Ocean executed one of the most talked-about moves in music industry history. By releasing “Endless” through Def Jam Recordings, he fulfilled his contract with the label, only to drop the widely acclaimed “Blonde” independently just one day later. This is how Frank Ocean left Def Jam while reportedly keeping control of a deal worth millions.
Frank Ocean’s signing with Def Jam
In 2009, Frank Ocean met Tricky Stewart, a songwriter and producer who signed him to his Def Jam Recordings imprint Red Zone Entertainment. Ocean released his debut studio album “Channel Orange” under the imprint. The album was an instant success and went on to win him his first Grammy but Frank still felt neglected by the label and later described the relationship as strictly transactional. Tricky Stewart would later say the following in an interview with the Fader:
“The label wasn’t motivated by the signing. They didn’t give him the respect that I thought he deserved. I couldn’t really get Def Jam to respond to him the way that I wanted them to respond to him.”
The reported $2 million advance
The deal that Ocean signed in 2009 included the release of two albums. After the success of his debut album, Def Jam reportedly decided to provide him with a $2 million advance. So in 2013, he started recording his sophomore album. The album was recorded in New York, Tokyo, London and Paris with credits ranging from Tyler, The Creator, Yung Lean, Beyoncé, James Blake and other world-renowned producers and songwriters. In other words, the process was clearly expensive.
The hype for Frank Ocean’s new album was enormous. In April of 2015, he announced that a new magazine called “Boys Don’t Cry” would be released in the summer of 2015 together with “album #3”. But nothing came. In a Reddit interview, one of the album’s producers called James Ho, better known as Malay, explained the delay as “It’s about making sure the perfect aesthetic for the situation has been reached, to do that, takes constant tweaking, trial and error. That goes for any creative situation.”
The release of Endless
Behind the scenes, a deal was formed between Apple Music, Def Jam and Frank Ocean for a visual album to be released exclusively on Apple Music. So on the 19th of August, a livestream of the artist woodworking in a warehouse appeared on his website. The stream lasted for almost six days, around 140 hours. The visual album featured 19 different songs including a cover of Aaliyah’s “At Your Best (You Are Love). The album received mixed reviews, with some critics finding it challenging. Pitchfork wrote “Endless is painfully dull, and perhaps that’s the point”. The Guardian followed in a similar way, stating “You might wonder at times… what on earth is going on.”
But just one day later, Ocean stunned fans by releasing the album “Blonde”. This time, the label wasn’t Def Jam or Universal but rather his own independent label named “Boys Don’t Cry”. It became clear that Blonde was the project that Frank Ocean had refined for years. The Guardian gave the album a 5/5 review calling it “one of the most intriguing and contrary records ever made”. Pitchfork later named it #1 out of the 200 best albums of the 2010s.
Forbes reported that in just over a week, the album had made $1 million with over 275 000 sales
Forbes reported that in just over a week, the album had made $1 million with over 275 000 sales. The Guardian reported that Lucian Grainge, the CEO of Universal Music Group, ordered the company’s labels (including Def Jam) to stop making “exclusive” distribution deals with streaming services.
The aftermath
Frank Ocean sat on a meticulously thought-out plan and executed it perfectly. In an exclusive interview with New York Times in November of 2016, he described the process of buying himself out of the contract with Def Jam “a seven-year chess game”. In an interview with Gayletter, Ocean told this about the process “I feel at peace with all that. I feel like the best outcome for myself was that outcome, and I feel proud of what I was able to get done with it.”
Conclusion
Few album rollouts have been as talked about as Frank Ocean’s 2016 release run. By releasing the “Endless” album through Def Jam Recordings he fulfilled his contract, allowing Frank Ocean to leave Def Jam on his own terms. Just a day later, Ocean released one of the century’s most well-respected albums, Blonde. Frank Ocean’s move sent shockwaves through the music industry and showed that even the biggest major-label systems could be challenged by artists.