On “There Will Be Tears”, Ocean gives us the heartbreaking ballad, but instead of being lovesick for a girl he sings about growing up without a father and losing his grandfather. A pretty rote love song is bookended with a monologue from Eyes Wide Shut, seemingly tearing into the misogyny of the track itself. “Songs For Women” playfully navigates the before and after of becoming a songwriter to get with girls, and what it feels like when the one girl isn’t interested. “We All Try” positions Ocean’s relationship with his girl by laying out his entire belief system. “Novacane” draws a parallel between a need to be numb and the current studio-frankensteined style of his genre, but still manages to walk us through a pretty specific story in a way you only see in golden age rap and singer-songwriter deep cuts. Subject matter, this is as much about sex and relationships as the Jodeci he takes a swipe at in one of the interstitials, but there is a breadth of language and approach to subject matter on this record that makes Nostalgia/Ultra different. In a year where R&B had an out-of-nowhere renaissance, between mainstream radio and weirdo online only releases (seriously, it may not be the best album but The Dream’s “Wedding Crasher” is probably my most-played track of the year), Frank Ocean managed to not have any competition in great songwriting (or in a few cases rewriting other people’s eh songs as great songs, fudging the “your favorite hip hop/r&b artist’s taste in rock is about the same as your mom’s” rule by making a Coldplay track pretty listenable).
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