Culture

Ice Rinks And Injured Ankles: Inside Frank Ocean’s Divisive 2023 Coachella Headline Set

by Charles Rushforth  19 April 2023

Want more Junkee in your life? Sign up to our newsletter, and follow us on Instagram and Facebook so you always know where to find us.

US Rapper Frank Ocean’s headline performance at Coachella has disappointed fans after a slew of pre-show complications made for an underwhelming show. 

Frank Ocean’s first live performance since 2017 was the drawcard for many attendees heading to Coachella this year, with fans theorising that the show would be accompanied by the release of a highly anticipated third studio album — one that he has reportedly been working on since releasing his critically acclaimed record Blonde.

Related
Squid Game, Babies And Fireworks: Rihanna's Super Bowl Show, Recapped

Sadly, after delaying his performance for over an hour past his scheduled time, Frank Ocean’s set consisted entirely of old material and a jarring vocal backing track. While a recent suggestion claimed that an ankle injury was behind the half-hearted performance — along with reports that an intricate ice-skating rink was originally planned for the show but bumped from production at 11th hour — upset fans aren’t convinced, chalking up the disappointment as something that is part and parcel of being a Frank Ocean fan.

“NO FRANK OCEAN MERCHANDISE”

The warning shots that signalled something was off with the rapidly approaching headline set came as Coachella confirmed that Frank Ocean’s show would not be available to live stream on YouTube, atypical of the majority of headliners from recent years. As fans on the ground at Coachella also quickly discovered, there wasn’t any mercy available at the festival either. A sign cautioning punters that they couldn’t buy Channel Orange apparel on-site quickly became a meme — reportedly, a light-fingered fan later stole the placard, which we can only assume will resurface as an NFT next month.

With a plethora of festival cancellations within the collective memory of Frank Ocean fans, people quickly presumed the worst. Those planning on enjoying the concert remotely scrambled to find a bootleg stream on TikTok or Instagram, to varying degrees of success. On the upside, it made for some pretty great memes.

An Early Peak After A Late Start

As the audience at Coachella’s main stage steadily grew in anticipation of Frank Ocean’s scheduled performance, it became apparent that the show wasn’t going to start on time. Finally gracing the stage an hour late, anticipation turned into euphoria as he opened the set with ‘Novacane’, the single from his career-spawning debut mixtape Nostalgia, Ultra.

After a touching tribute to his recently deceased brother (“I know he would have been so excited to be here with all of us”), Frank shifted the focus over to French DJ Crystallmess who led the Coachella crowd into a lengthy DJ set that Frank seemed content to vibe to rather than join. This move split the Coachella audience, with fans presumably expecting more from a beloved artist they haven’t heard from in six years. Pretty much everybody loved the twerking security guard projected onto the mega screen, though.

After a few more songs including a reworked version of ‘White Ferrari’, Frank suddenly informed the crowd that the show had exceeded the festival’s official curfew, wishing everyone a good night as he promptly ended the performance.

Ice Rinks And Injured Ankles: What Happened?

The half-baked performance prompted multiple theories as to what was happening behind the scenes prior to the set. Speaking to Pitchfork, a source close to Frank said the artist had injured his ankle a week prior while rehearsing the performance, changing the production for the show after being advised by a doctor to take pressure off his ankle.

Music insiders The Festive Owl included a different account taken from anonymous sources from within the production team at Coachella, which paints a description of a haphazard Frank Ocean jettisoning the show at the last minute.

“Frank decided at the last minute that he no longer wanted it at all,” the account detailed in a  lengthy series of tweets.

“All of the people walking around him at the start of the performance were actually ice skaters, had been practicing for weeks, and were supposed to be skating as part of the production. Coachella had to deconstruct the approved stage (that had been planned and signed off on for months in advance) + melt the entire ice rink and then set it up how Frank decided today with no warning. Which is what you ended up seeing, and caused the hour-long delay.”

The account also claims that Frank “pulled the plug at the last second” on the planned Coachella live stream of the performance. At the time of writing, neither the artist nor the festival has confirmed or denied this description of events. Seeing as Frank is scheduled to perform again at the second weekend of the festival, they’re probably unlikely to.

It’s important to remember that while even Frank described the performance as “chaotic“, not everybody had a bad time at the show. Celebrity attendees like SZA and Justin Bieber appeared to have a good time, with the later quoting he was “blown away” by the performance via Instagram.

Perhaps the mixture of joy and cognitive dissonance is best summed up by the Twitter fan club Frank Ocean Daily: “was last night fun? yes. do people have a right to be mad about his set? also yes!!!”

Photo credit: Getty Images