Frank Ocean, and specifically Blonded Radio, his sporadic Beats 1 show, will be the death of us all soon, I am convinced. This morning, the sixth instalment of the show – which only ever comes by surprise and therefore doles out heart attacks across Twitter timelines the world over – aired, and as a special treat, it was fronted by Frank himself (maybe he really is coming out of that shell).
The show had a special Mother’s Day slant, with Frank singling Nicki Minaj out for a tribute. He also played “Did You See” by London rapper/singer J Hus, whose album Common Sense, dropped Friday (12th May), and ended with the premiere of a new A$AP Rocky track, “RAF,” which features Frank, Quavo and Lil Uzi Vert. Elsewhere, the show’s playlist, included below, was as eclectic and listenable as ever.
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As someone who doesn’t speak publicly too much, Frank’s on-air persona has as much charm as it does on record. As usual, he comes across as someone with real musical integrity, who massively knows his stuff. Hopefully he’ll now be a regular fixture on the show, but considering his past form, I wouldn’t bet on it.
Here’s that tracklist:
Burial, “Come Down To Us”
House of Pharaohs, “RWM (Run With Me)
Ka5sh, “I’m Depressed”
A$AP Rocky, “Lord Pretty Flacko Jodye 2 (LPFJ2)”
J. Hus, “Did You See”
M.T. Hadley, “Janet”
Tupac, “Dear Mama”
Outkast, “Ms Jackson”
Eykah Badu, “Hello”
Rufus & Chaka Khan, “Your Smile”
Frank Ocean, “At Your Best (You Are Love)”
The Beatles, “Rocky Raccoon”
The Beatles, “Here, There and Everywhere”
Frank Ocean, “White Ferrari”
The Flaming Lips, “Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots, Pt 1”
Micachu, “Go” (With Tirzah)
MssingNo, “Fones”
Dam Funk, “Mirrors”
Andres, “You’re Still The One”
Kuedo, “Whisper Fate”
Caribou, “Hannibal”
LCD Soundsystem, “American Dream”
Crying, “Well and Spring”
Miley Cyrus, “Rooting For My Baby”
Metronomy, “This Could Be Beautiful (It Is)”
Frank Ocean, “Nikes”
Shawty Pimp, “Kickin’ Pimpin’”
Juvenile, “Ha”
A$AP Rocky f. Frank Ocean, Lil Uzi Vert, and Quavo, “RAF”
Ryuichi Sakamoto, “Merry Christmas, Mr Lawrence”
If you’re an Apple Music subscriber, you can listen back to Blonded Radio 006 at 11AM BST/6AM ET and 2PM BST/9 AM ET here.
You can find Lauren on Twitter.
(Image via Beats1 on Twitter)
