The entire internet is looking at Frank Ocean like...
The entire internet is looking at Frank Ocean like... Featureflash Photo Agency / Shutterstock.com

Frank Ocean's new album, Boys Don't Cry, was supposed to drop last July. That didn't happen. There were reports that the album was going to drop last week. But, again, it didn't happen. There have been reports, even in the New York Times, that the album is supposed to drop today, but it has not happened yet. Therefore, many people are feeling like this:


That's because Summer 2016 does not happen until Boys Don't Cry happens.

Ocean's Grammy-winning Channel Orange WAS Summer 2012, and there are currently no contenders for Album of the Summer 2016. (Chance the Rapper's Coloring Book came a little too early to nab the title.)

But beyond silly seasonal designations, Channel Orange was a strong debut that was as lyrically and musically complex as it was catchy. Somehow Frank Ocean made you dance to "Pyramids," a ten-minute epic that splices the life of a stripper named Cleopatra with the ancient Egyptian queen.

"Super Rich Kids" offered LA and NY fashion kids a moment of self reflection and everybody else a quintessential cruising jam. And then there's all the gritty heartbreak on "Pilot Jones" and "Crack Rock."

But it was the single, "Thinkin' Bout You," that destroyed everybody. It's a perfect bedroom R&B song that contains the depths of a literary short story. Ocean's cleverly placed line breaks enact the speaker's anxiety, and the lyrics are both sophisticated and believably sweet. When you hear it your mind floods with images of unrequited loves, and during the chorus you try to hit that highest of high notes with as much pure soul and plain pain as he does, but you can only do it in your mind. Like Prince, D'Angelo, and Marvin Gaye, Ocean doesn't lose his distinctive timbre in his falsetto. He's got range even in the highest octaves.

You can hear him hit that note during one of the greatest SNL music performances of all time:

Being openly gay/bisexual in the hip hop world is no joke, either.

Maybe all this waiting is part of some kind of ultimate seduction. Is Frank Ocean edging an entire nation? Maybe. Whatever the case, it's time: