By Andrea Buenrostro
After releasing his sophomore album last summer, Frank Ocean is back with a new single titled ‘Chanel’.
Fans were pleasantly surprised to hear a new song by Ocean, last Friday, on his “Blonded” radio segment on Beats 1 (an exclusive Apple Music radio station). Considering fans had to wait 4 years for his second album to release, 7 months for any news seemed like a miracle. Although Ocean typically produces his own music, he teamed up with Swedish productive duo “Jarami” to create ‘Chanel’. On the radio show, the remix of the song featuring American rapper, ASAP Rocky, was also aired. After the single was released, Ocean headed to his tumblr to post a picture of the cover alongside of the lyrics.
‘Chanel’ is a 3 and a half minute piano sombered track with a mellow hip-hop beat. Frank takes turns singing and speaking more rapidly throughout it. Fanatics have already started to dissect the lyrics, and have come to the conclusion that theme might be about his bisexuality. Right off the bat, the chorus reads, “I see both sides like Chanel, I see on both sides like Chanel,” which refers to the French high end fashion brand but can also be interpreted as he sees both sides of his sexuality, homo and hetero. He compares his duality to the Chanel logo, that has two C’s facing the opposite direction.
Soon after the release of the single, the people of Chanel took to instagram to post their version of things. The first picture they posted was a simple black and white text that said, “We see both sides like Frank,” with the caption, “We see both sides like Frank Ocean. #YouKnowMeAndYouDont #FrankOcean #CHANEL.” The second post was a split picture of the ocean with the word “ocean” as an overlay and their Chanel No. 5 fragrance with the word “land” as an overlay (and the same caption as the first one). This lead spectators to believe that Frank Ocean and Chanel might be releasing a collaboration however, rest assured a spokesperson for Chanel told FADER that it was simply their “way of acknowledging his nod” to the brand.
Unfortunately we won’t be expecting any collabs on purses from Ocean anytime soon, but in the meantime we can listen to his first single of the year here.