Frank Ocean’s highly anticipated return seems to have been welcomed by almost everyone, except those at his now former record label, Def Jam.
As Pitchfork report, Frank Ocean’s visual album Endless was only released as it “fulfills Frank’s obligations to Def Jam and Universal.”
This news comes days after the release of Frank Ocean’s highly anticipated sophomore album, Blonde, which saw an independent release on Ocean’s own Boys Don’t Cry label.
Following the release of Endless on August 19th, Ocean ended his contract with Def Jam Records and their parent company Universal Music Group. This left Frank free to release his long-awaited second studio album Blonde independently.
This was confirmed by the metadata on the Apple Music release of Blonde, stating that copyright belongs to Boys Don’t Cry, and not Island Def Jam Music Group, as was the case with Endless and his 2012 debut Channel Orange.
Ocean’s decision to leave Def Jam has left Universal Music Group with the decision now as to whether to continue offering exclusive streaming rights, Forbes reports.
Whether this means that Universal are going to stop streaming for artists on their label, which include Drake and Kanye West, to name a few, remains to be seen, but we can be certain that this won’t be a problem that is going to be solved quickly.
