Frank Ocean Gives a Big Middle Finger to the Music Industry

Just in time for the Grammys, Frank Ocean has let it rip, holding little back about how he feels about the music industry. From Music Business Worldwide:

Being sensible, here’s today’s important music industry news: Frank Ocean says he now owns all of his masters.

That’s all of them, including Channel Orange – the artist’s much-loved 2012 debut album originally released through Def Jam/Universal.

Apparently, Ocean recently bought his catalogue’s rights back from UMG; no doubt during the fallout of his label-baiting, industry-changing dual release of 2016 albums Endless (the Universal one) and Blonde (the self-issued one).

In the coming days, we’ll ponder what this means for the future of artist empowerment and the ultimate fate of major record companies.

But for now, a much more important question.

Seriously, what is it with music business institutions thinking it’s cool to publicly slate the actions of revered artists?

This really is worth reading.