Frank Ocean's sophomore album Blonde hit No. 1 as an independent record--and it means a significant pay raise for the R&B star.
While Ocean is far from the first artist to release a chart-topping independent album, it is the means by which he gained his independence from his former label that garnered widespread attention. As FORBES first reported, Ocean maneuvered his way out his contract with former publisher Def Jam and its parent company Universal Music Group (UMG) by releasing a 45-minute visual album titled Endless earlier this month. That release fulfilled Ocean's contractual obligations to Def Jam and Universal, sources close to the situation told FORBES, paving the way for the artist to drop Blonde on his independent label Boys Don't Cry, which is not affiliated with Def Jam.
The decoupling has had tremendous financial implications for the 28-year-old singer. Blonde sold 276,000 equivalent album units since its release last Saturday release, according to Billboard. Without a major label, Ocean stands to earn more than double from the record, which was released exclusively on Apple Music and iTunes, than he would have done had he still been signed to Def Jam, based on FORBES' calculations.
Advances aside, in-demand artists signed to a major label--especially those who write their own songs--can typically earn between $1.50 to $2.00 per album sold. Since Ocean released the album independently, sources close to the situation said that he could bank between $5 to $7.50 per equivalent album sold (Blonde retails on iTunes for $9.99). A representative for Ocean could not be immediately reached for comment.
Apple, meanwhile, pockets a quarter of Blonde's list price while taking on marketing costs. Given that that album was independent, there was likely no advance and Ocean's Boys Don't Cry would have shouldered the $500,000 or so cost of making the release. After removing those expenses, Ocean is left with an estimated $1 million in profit in just one week. If Ocean had still been on Def Jam, he would have been owed $550,000, a good portion of which would likely have gone back to the label to pay off the advance he would have received.
Though Ocean looks like he made the right move, going independent and dropping the album exclusively on Apple Music had its fair share of risks. Blonde has been effectively a digital-only album, with the only physical copies to date distributed inside free magazines that were given away as a promotion. If he hopes to release it as a CD at a later date, he could have trouble.
"If you say, 'Hey, I'm going to give Apple Music or Tidal a one week exclusive on streaming,' then you just decimated your physical order at Best Buy or Trans World [Entertainment]," says Travis O'Guin, CEO of Kansas City, Mo.-based independent label Strange Music, which he cofounded with rapper Tech N9ne. Strange Music still sells 62% of its music as physical CDs--an anomaly in today's music business.
Ocean's records, however, typically do well online: The majority of first week sales for Ocean's Def Jam debut Channel Orange were digital, though it was released on physical CD mid-week following its 2012 iTunes launch.
But in order to keep capitalizing, Ocean will have to hit the road. "If you don't have live shows which then also turn into merchandising opportunities you can't continue to make music, because making quality music has an expense attached," says O'Guin, whose Strange Music records bring back between $4 to $8 per album sold and typically retail for a pricier $18.98. Tech N9ne, meanwhile, maintains one of the busiest touring schedules of any Hip-Hop Cash King, playing 70-plus shows in our 2016 scoring period.
Ocean originally signed to Def Jam under the stage name "Lonny Breaux," but became frustrated by how the label treated him. He released a mixtape, Nostalgia Ultra, under his current name, in 2011, explaining what he thought of his publisher in a profanity-laced tirade on his Tumblr account. That album set the stage for his full label debut Channel Orange, which came out in the summer of 2012.
Blonde was the much-hyped successor to that album, but was not owned by Def Jam or UMG. Ocean was able to extricate himself from his deal by dropping the visual album Endless, leaving him to release Blonde on his own via Apple Music. That decision is said to have infuriated UMG Lucian Grainge, who decided to eliminate future exclusive deals with Apple for all Universal artists.
Billboard's chart currently equates 10 digital track sales from an album to one equivalent album sale and 1,500 song streams from an album to one equivalent album sale. The songs on Blonde album generated 65.4 million streams during the week; by that math, the album was purchased outright 232,000 times. That is just under half the 485,000 albums that Beyonce's Lemonade sold and 27% of the 852,000 albums that Drake's Views managed in their debut weeks.
Not bad for an indie project.
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