Wondering When Frank Ocean Will Release His New Album? Maybe He Already Has

Twist!

Ever since Frank Ocean turned his musical tap back on to give us visual album Endless and regular, audio album Blonde, we’ve greedily returned to our pre-2016 line of questioning: Where’s the album, Frank?

He once promised to give us five albums before he turned 30, and in November of 2017 (at age 30 and one month), with only four albums under his belt, he quipped on Tumblr: "I made the album before 30. I just aint put that b**** out!"

Could it be that he has a fifth album ready and roaring to go, to be dropped at a moment’s notice on any unsuspecting authors who are busily trying to complete their spicy Frank Ocean takes before deadline?

Or, did we misunderstand him? And was last year’s slow-drip of singles his "fifth album" in bite-sized form? It would make sense: He just doesn’t seem that concerned with the old metrics of a musical legacy, be it 'Grammy nominations' (he withdrew himself from consideration), 'promotional roll-outs' or even the format of a traditional album. Dude even keeps flaking on distributing Endless on vinyl.

On Comedy Bang Bang recently, "Weird Al" Yankovic (stay with us here) reflected on his newfound freedom from the record labels, happy and excited to release his parodies as singles at a time when they’re still relevant: "The whole album thing… I just don’t like the idea of having to wait around until I have like 12 songs to release all at once." That he followed it up with a "Hamilton Polka" sort of defeated the point. Still, Weird Al and potentially Frank understand the new model better than most.

Ocean has given us a full album’s worth of material over the last year, and we’re still twiddling our thumbs, waiting for something more... formal? Maybe the problem (stares intently at mirror while "We All Try" plays) is with us.

Anyway, if you’ve been crying over Frank's 'album drought', here are the ten songs he’s released or been featured on since Blonde dropped in August of 2016 (including his cover of "Moon River", which technically came out after his 30th birthday). We've even gone to the trouble of sequencing them for you. And at 40 minutes, it’s just five minutes shy of Endless. Enjoy!

1. "Chanel" by Frank Ocean