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You stayed in New Orleans until after Katrina, then drove cross-country with just $1,100 in your pocket. So my mom was like, "You're going to follow that bum? Maybe you should just go to law school." My dad had been a singer and keyboardist. And writing Langston Hughes replica poems became me wanting to write like Stevie Wonder. Somewhere in that season of my life, singing along with the radio became me wanting to be on radio, you know. When did you start recording? I booked my first studio at like 12 or 13. He was a mentor at AA and NA, and I would go with him to meetings. He didn't speak a terrible amount, but you could tell there was a ton on his mind-like a quiet acceptance of how life had turned out. My grandfather was smart and had a whole lot of pride. I was his second chance, and he gave it his best shot. He'd had a really troubled life with crack, heroin, and alcohol and had kids he wasn't an ideal parent to. She worked hard to become a residential contractor-got her master's with honors at the University of New Orleans. I used to go to every class with her. Her father was my paternal figure. And for a while, you know, we were not middle-class. Your dad had left when you were 6, so your mom raised you on her own. In a bit, he'll Instagram a bejeweled portrait of himself, but first he unveils three new tracks, stored on his phone, that Pharrell pronounces "crazy, with a lot of comprehensive layers just sort of living harmoniously." When Ocean says he worries a rap number called "Blue Whale" is "risky because I'm rhyming," Pharrell shakes his head. Ocean, dressed in a gray Supreme hoodie, jeans, and black Wallabees, smiles as he dons the weighty necklace-it jibes with the new Rolex on his left wrist, the Cartier Juste Un Clou bracelet on his right. "Sweet," Ocean replies, picking up Pharrell's diamond-studded gold chain that sits-fat as a tow rope-at the edge of the mixing board. " Here you are," the prolific rapper and producer tells him. When we walk in, Ocean leading the way, Pharrell Williams turns down the music and greets him warmly. If Frank Ocean wanted to play you a song, you'd drive across town in the pouring rain, right? That's how we've ended up at Jungle City, a sound studio in Manhattan's Chelsea neighborhood.
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