Four years removed from his highly successful debut album Channel Orange, Frank Ocean returned to the music scene back in August when he released a visual album online titled Endless, followed by another digital album two days later called Blonde. Many of his fans, including Kanye West, presumed Frank would be nominated for several Grammy's in 2017 for the success of Blonde, which earned the #1 spot in the opening week on Billboard, but its appears that won’t be happening and Frank is totally fine with that.
In an in-depth interview with NY Times, Frank revealed that he isn’t too fond the awards system process, believing it’s all out dated & metaphorically comparing his refusal to attend to that of Colin Kaepernick’s national anthem protest. “I think the infrastructure of the awarding system and the nomination system and screening system is dated,” he said. “I’d rather this be my Colin Kaepernick moment for the Grammys than sit there in the audience.”
Frank did acknowledge to journalist Jon Caramanica that his first two Grammy wins were very significant at the time, but now believes it doesn’t represent the people of where he comes from.
“That institution certainly has nostalgic importance,” he said. “It just doesn’t seem to be representing very well for people who come from where I come from, and hold down what I hold down.” He noted that since he was born, just a few black artists have won album of the year, that being Quincy Jones, Herbie Hancock, and Ray Charles.
Frank also added that now that he’s no longer signed to a label he can do whatever he wants musically, even if that means never putting out another full length album again. “Because I’m not in a record deal, I don’t have to operate in an album format,” he told the Times. “I can operate in half-a-song format.”
Read all that & a whole bunch more in the new interview in NY Times here.