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Frank Ocean · S1 E6
Westward Bound
Packing up and heading to Los Angeles to chase a career in music
Six weeks after Katrina, Christopher Breaux loads everything he owns into a car and points it toward Interstate 10 West. Seventeen hundred miles of highway, no contacts, no money, and one destination: the city where hit songs get written.
"Forrest Gump" (Frank Ocean, live at the 55th Grammy Awards, 2013). Named after the character who just keeps running forward no matter what life throws at him. That's exactly what a teenager from New Orleans did when the water took everything: he kept moving.
Forrest Gump, Frank Ocean (2012)
Forrest Gump rides on a bouncy synth loop and a falsetto that sounds almost carefree, but the song is really about chasing something you might never catch. Frank produced it with Malay, and the track captures the dizzy forward momentum of someone who refuses to stop moving. Listen for the way the melody keeps climbing upward, always reaching. For a kid who lost everything and decided the only option was to drive seventeen hundred miles toward a city he'd never been to, that relentless optimism is the whole story.
Sources
Dombal, Ryan. "Frank Ocean: channel ORANGE." Pitchfork, July 2012.
Caramanica, Jon. "Frank Ocean's Lonely, Lovely Debut." The New York Times, July 2012.
The Decision
There is nothing left in New Orleans for him. The house is wrecked, the studio is gone, the recordings are destroyed. Some Katrina survivors wait for the city to rebuild, but Frank doesn't wait. He decides that if he has to start from zero, he might as well do it in the city where songs get made.
Sources
Wallace, Amy. "Frank Ocean: The All-American Boy." GQ, December 2012.
Los Angeles, California
Seventeen hundred miles west of New Orleans. In the mid-2000s, LA is the center of the pop and R&B songwriting industry, with studios in Hollywood and the Valley producing hits for every major label. This is where Frank is heading.
“He didn't come to Los Angeles to be a pop star. He came to write. He saw himself as a craftsman, not a celebrity.”
— Amy Wallace, "Frank Ocean: The All-American Boy," GQ, December 2012
TAP TO REVEAL: Why did Frank choose LA over New York, Nashville, or Atlanta?
Provider, Frank Ocean (2017)
A single Frank dropped in 2017 about stepping up and taking care of the people who matter. The lush, layered production and warm vocal feel like a promise. In an episode about a teenager leaving home with nothing, this song is the answer to the question every Katrina survivor asked: who's going to provide? Frank decided it would be him.
Provider, Frank Ocean (2017)
"I'm the provider, been your provider." Read the lyrics while you listen. Provider is Frank writing as someone who has made it, looking back at all the people he takes care of now. Every line is built on the foundation of a kid who left New Orleans with nothing and decided that would never be the case again.
Westward Bound: The File
Why did Frank Ocean move to Los Angeles after Hurricane Katrina?
The car pulls into Los Angeles and Christopher Breaux has nowhere to sleep tonight. Next season: a songwriter sleeping in his car outside the studio, ghostwriting hits for Beyoncé, and the record deal that nearly buried him.
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