Dissect - S3E4 – Pyramids (Part 1) by Frank Ocean

Episode Date: June 12, 2018

We dissect Frank Ocean’s 10-minute masterwork “Pyramids” from Channel Orange. Part 1 of 2. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

From Spotify Studios, welcome to dissect, long-form musical analysis broken into short digestible episodes. I'm your host, Cole Kushner. Today, we continue our serialized analysis of Channel Orange by Frank Ocean. On our last episode, we dissected a trio of songs that expounded upon the effects of wealth. On the song Sweet Life, we heard about an uncultured woman ignorant to the world outside her gated life in Ladera Heights. The skit, not just money, provided a sharp contrast to Sweet Life, as we heard from a poor by their attempting to teach her son the value of money. The song's super rich kids immediately follows, portraying a drug-abusing teen born into extreme wealth, lonely and reckless because of his

neglectful parents and superficial friends. At the end of super rich kids, the television motif appears once again, as we hear Frank flipping through channels. The fantastic product. We once had things in common. Not the only thing we share is the refrigerator. Frank lands on Pilot Jones. The next song, on Channel Orange. Pilot Jones is an extended metaphor as Frank characterizes his complex relationship with a drug-abusing woman. She's addicted to drugs, and he's addicted to her. He coins this woman, Pilot Jones, a name with several clever meanings. Pilot, because like a plane in the sky, she gets him high with her love. Jones because he's addicted, he's jonesing, and she is his dealer,

his fix. Throughout the song, he attempts to resist the woman, much like a drug addict will attempt to resist their addiction, but the protagonist ultimately resigns by the song's end, living in, quote, A condo on the cloud. As Pilot Jones, Pilot Jones, living the sky, I go. So, man, if I got a condo on a cloud, then I guess you can. Crack Rock is in part inspired by Frank's grandfather, a former addict. Frank told The Guardian, quote, For a song like Crack Rock, my grandfather, who had struggled to be a father for my mom and my uncle,

his second chance at fatherhood was me. In his early 20s, he had a host of problems with addiction and substance abuse. When I knew him, he was a mentor for the N.A. and AA groups. I used to go to the meetings and hear these stories from the addicts, heroin and crack and alcohol. So stories like that influence a song like that. unquote. Crack Rock is full of intricate wordplay, and while we don't have time to cover the track line by line, I would like to spend some time discussing the song in broad strokes, while also zeroing in on a few essential details. Like Pilot Jones, verse one of Crack Rock uses double

entendras to portray sex and drug addiction. I don't know how little you matter until you're all alone in the middle of Arkansas with a little rock left in that glass dick, used to date a blonde. Frank begins to hit it raw Because she was and you are madly involved Manly involved It's in stone In glass homes

Frank begins the verse You don't know how little you matter Until you're all alone in the middle of Arkansas With a little rock left on that glass dick Cleverly Frank plays off Little Rock a la Arkansas state capital To portray a piece of crack cocaine And a glass crack pipe

Little Rock left in that glass dick also begins the double entendres that continue throughout the verse. Frank sings, used to date a blonde, you used to hit it raw, because she was and you are madly involved. On its surface, it portrays the protagonist having unprotected sex with a blonde ex-girlfriend,

but blonde implies a white woman, and white girl is slaying for powder cocaine, the pure form of cocaine, hence the line used to hit it raw. In verse 2, the protagonist turns to crime to feed his addiction, and his family begins to distance themselves. from him. Crack Rock's hook condenses this man's story into three tragic lines.

To sleep with cracket in stones and glass homes, you're smoking stones and abandoned home. You hit them stones and you broke your home. Frank plays off the saying, those who live in glass house, Frank plays off the saying, those who live in glass shouldn't throw stones, singing, hitting stones and glass homes. Here he's referring to crack cocaine, crack rocks, being smoked out of a glass pipe. Next he sings, you're smoking stones and abandoned homes, alluding to the man's homelessness and smoking crack and abandoned drug houses. Finally, he sings, you hit them stones and broke your home, which calls out the isolation from his family and the hurt and instability his addiction caused them. Frank then sings Crack Rock a number

of times, the song's title. This most obviously refers to a piece of crack cocaine, often called rocks. But as we've seen time and time again with Frank's music, there's often a double or even triple meaning to his song titles. Crack rock could refer to the physical shaking or rocking motion one exhibits while high on crack and or the trembling experience when going through withdrawals. Rock is also used to refer to someone or something strong and reliable, like family or a significant other. A crack rock then alludes to the deterioration of the protagonist's family life. As crack rock continues into the bridge, the scope of the song widens, and Frank talks more broadly about drug issues in America. Crack rock, crack crack. Cricket cap, deck, how much dope can you push to me?

Quicket cap that cap. No good for community. Fucking pick his shots. Frank sings for me. My brother get box and don't know I'd hear the sound. Don't know I'd hear the rounds. Frank sings, Crooked cop, dead cop. How much dope can you push to me?

Crooked cop, dead cop, no good for community. Here, Frank alludes to governmental involvement pushing drugs into inner city communities. We think back to the song's opening lines where it's established that the protagonist lives in Arkansas, a state that has an interesting history with cocaine. It's been speculated by many that the Mena Airport in Arkansas was used by the CIA as a drop point for importing cocaine from Latin America in the 1980s.

And according to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, the U.S. State Department paid almost a million dollars to four companies owned and operated by narcotic traffickers in the early 80s. And much of the cocaine being trafficked in the U.S. made its way to inner cities, sold to gang members in places like south central Los Angeles, who then sold it to users in inner city communities. At the same time, the war on drugs in America was in full effect, and new legislation was being passed to harshen the penalties of certain drugs. Specifically regarding cocaine, the prison sentence disparity between possession of crack, the cheaper processed form of cocaine, used mostly by poor black Americans, was 100 times longer than powder cocaine, a more expensive drug used primarily by whites. Frank continues to bridge, alluding to more governmental racial bias, singing, fucking pig get shot, 300 men will search for me, my brother get popped, and don't know

when hear the sound. Frank seems to be pointing out that despite being involved in importing crack cocaine into America, the death of a cop receives much more attention than the death of an addict of color, like the one portrayed on crack rock. The black addict is seen as a bottom dweller of society. His death not worthy of our resources, despite the government helping to create the cocaine problem that led to the destruction of the protagonist's once stable life. crack rock concludes with an abrupt but calculated ending Before that abrupt Before that abrupt outro

Frank sings Don't know in dispute Nirvana Don't no one want to blow the high It seems he's pointing out our society's tendency to ignore problems like crack addiction in order to carry on the facade of an idealistic blue-pill society. Toward the end of the song, there's a sudden mysterious shift to a woman character. Frank says, How you feeling, girl? How's the gutter doing?

By Frank's use of gutter, we might suspect the woman here is also an addict, and in contrast to a society that doesn't seem to care much for her, Frank is generally asking how she's feeling. But given the abruptness of the song's ending, I believe this section is also a conscious segue into the album's next track, Pyramids, an ambitious, sprawling story that describes the tragic decline of a woman named Cleopatra. At nearly 10 minutes long, Pyramids is a sonic centerpiece of Channel Orange, and one of the most beloved songs in Ocean's repertoire. We're going to spend two episodes breaking down this modern

masterwork, which will begin right after the break. Welcome back to dissect. Before the break, we discussed the song Pilot Jones and Crack Rock, both of which center around addiction. On Pilot Jones, we heard a character who fell for a drug dealer, only to give in to his addiction on the song's end. On crack rock, we heard about the effects of drug addiction and the addict's position at the bottom of the societal totem pole. At the end of crack rock, we heard Frank's attention abruptly shift to a female character, leading into the album's next track, one of the most beloved songs in Frank's entire repertoire, pyramids.

Skin like bruns and a head like cashmerems As we marched to the rhythm On the palace floors Pyramids was released on June 8th, 2012. It was the album's second quote-unquote single, but at nearly 10 minutes long, it's far from your traditional radio-friendly hit. The song was written and produced by Frank Ocean and Malay,

with the additional production by a Moss Keith and a guitar solo by John Mayer. Pyramids is a virtuastic display of Ocean's ability to tell a story through song. Ocean speaks often about his songs being story set to music, telling the New York Times, quote, The work is the work, the work is not me. I like the anonymity that directors can have about their films. Even though it's my voice, I'm a storyteller, unquote. He also told Fader Magazine, quote, I'm really trying to create this environment around the song that makes the listener feel like they're in this place,

and they're hearing the story, and not only are they hearing it, they're really seeing it, unquote. Pyramids is split in two large parts, separated by a sweeping, transported and middle section that literally acts as a wormhole into the future. Pyramid's two halves are thematically and narratively linked by the song's main character, Cleopatra, who finds herself in the center of both worlds. Cleopatra was of course one of the most famous female rulers in history. She was a member of the Ptolemaic dynasty, a Greek family who ruled Egypt after the death of Alexander the Great. Cleopatra was highly intelligent, fluent in several languages, and her charm and beauty are literally the stuff of legend. After the death of her father in 51 BC, an 18-year-old Cleopatra became the queen of Egypt. Infamously, Cleopatra became romantically involved with dictator of the Roman Republic, Julius Caesar,

an alliance that helped restore Cleopatra's rule of Egypt after a brief exile. The two bore a child, and Cleopatra was present in Rome when Caesar was assassinated. After Caesar's death, Cleopatra aligned herself with Mark Antony, one of Caesar's successors, who ruled Rome during an unstable period following Caesar's assassination. Beginning as political alliance, Antony and Cleopatra became romantically involved, had a total of three children together and eventually married. In 31 BC, Antony and Cleopatra aligned their armies and attempt to defeat Octavian and gain control of Rome. Antony and Cleopatra were defeated, forcing the two to flee back to Egypt.

Upon his eventual return to the battlefield, Antony was falsely informed that Cleopatra had died. Distraught in facing eminent defeat, Antony committed suicide by stabbing himself. Upon hearing of Antony's suicide, Cleopatra killed herself on August 12th in the year 30 BC. While the circumstances surrounding her death are hazy at best, it's generally thought that Cleopatra killed herself by enticing an asp or Egyptian cobra to bite her arm, apparently a common way to commit suicide during this time. Cleopatra has since become an iconic figure of history. Of course, there's a tabloid-like fascination and legacy due to her affairs with powerful men.

But more importantly, Cleopatra represents a powerful woman, who in a male-dominated society, held together a country during a tumultuous time in history, proving to be a formidable, powerful leader, every equal to her male counterparts. Pyramids opens with a descending four-core progression that repeats the entire first half. half. We have an F minor, D flat major, a C suspended, and a B flat minor. These chords are introduced in the beginning of the song, played by what sounds like a sampled synthesizer. The triggered chords play a syncopated rhythm, that is, they play on unusual parts of the beat so that the pulse or groove of the song is masked uncertainty, a sentiment accentuated by the moody, mysterious quality of

the descending chords. When Ocean enters a song, an unusual drumbeat enters with him. Unusual because the drums are played backwards. So what would typically sound like this becomes this. On a song centered around Cleopatra, who died in 30 BC, backwards drum sounds certainly help to evoke a movement backwards in time. Ocean enters with the first half's hook, setting the stage for the story to come. Ocean begins, set the cheetahs on the loose. There's a thief out on the move. Underneath our

legion's view, they have taken Cleopatra. Straight away, Ocean puts paint on the canvas with vivid imagery of sprinting cheetahs, animals known to be tamed and kept as pets by royalty in ancient Egypt. The cheetahs are set out to search for an unnamed thief who has captured Cleopatra. Ocean's use of the word Legion in the line underneath our Legion's view is a detailed stroke of lyrical craftsmanship, as the Legion was a word first created and used to describe a basic unit of ancient Rome's army. Ocean's hook, though, is by no means historically accurate, nor is it attempting to be. Cleopatra, as far as we know, was never kidnapped. The key takeaway from this opening hook is that Cleopatra, who we suspect might be representative

of something larger, has been captured, has been stolen. As Pyramids continues, Ocean resists. assumes the song's story while backing vocals repeat the name Cleopatra throughout. Run, run, run, run, the throne of our queen is empty. Here we get more emphasis on the fact that Cleopatraon has been stolen, while the words glory, crown, Pharaoh, throne, and queen continue to evoke Egyptian majesty and grandeur. At this point, we start to wonder who exactly our narrator is,

as he says, come back for my glory, bring her back to me. For now we can only speculate that he might be a king, or perhaps metaphorically something larger, like Egypt or Africa itself. Interestingly, the name Cleopatra means glory of the Father, giving the line, Come Back for My Glory, an even deeper resonance. The bridge comes to an abrupt stop as all the musical material drops out, and a brassy, heavily textured synthesizer plays a commanding riff. This riff, which will name the pyramid theme for reasons that will become clear in a moment,

is a stark contrast from the musical material that comes before it. It begins by ascending the first four notes of the F minor scale, F, G, A, and B, And then it scales back down those same notes it played on the way up. Now the interesting thing about this theme is the shape it makes sonically. We have an ascension, peaking here on a B flat, followed by a descent. Now let's think about a shape that ascends, peaks, then immediately descends. That shape is a triangle, like a pyramid, right? Though you can't see it here, the musical notation of this theme, that is when the notes are written

out in a musical score, the ascending descending melody does indeed resendent. a pyramid shape. Upon this discovery, we also realize that the melodies Frank is sung on the song thus far, feature an ascending, descending melodic pyramid shape. Let's take the opening few lines, O.O.O.O. Set the Cheetahs on the loose. Up, down. Up again. Again, if you were to see these written out on a musical staff, the pyramid shape becomes quite obvious. Being an unintentional coincidence or a brilliant compositional detail, these pyramid shapes are undeniable, and in my opinion it's a pretty amazing discovery. While the abrupt interjection of the EDM-inspired pyramid's theme may sound disjointed and out of place on first listen, its presence signals the transformation of the song's

musical setting. A new bouncing floor-in-the-floor drumbeat is introduced, accentuated by an undulating synth bass. We find ourselves now quite literally in a dance club, though it's an imagined dance club inside the walls of the Egyptian pyramids. Playing off the run run run run lines of the bridge, ocean begins the verse, while run into the future. He then proceeds to paint a fantastical, dreamlike scene at a modern dance club, taking place inside the Egyptian pyramids. Frank adds subtle brushstrokes of contextual detail, describing bronze skin, cashmere hair, trembling chandeliers hanging from the ceiling, and crashing symbols, all of which are accompanied by the thumping dance hall rhythms over which ocean sings.

This first verse is a fantastical imagining by our story's narrator. He imagines Cleopatra returning to him, only for the two to, quote, run into the future, and escape whatever unnamed danger they currently find themselves in, a danger that we assume led to Cleopatra Leopatra's kidnapping. The verse also foreshadows the song's second half, where we're quite literally find ourselves in the future. After a repetition of the song's hook, verse two is introduced, adding a twist to the song's narrative. Inside that go I find you laying down

Safegu' And his full head of hair My black queen, Cleopatra Bad dreams, Cleopatra Ocean begins the verse The Jewel of Africa What good is a jewel that ain't still precious?

We first think of Cleopatra, powerful and beautiful, being the metaphoric jewel of Africa. The narrator eludes, to a falling from grace, implying she's lost her precious status, a point we'll return to in a moment. We think also of Zimbabwe, the African country nicknamed the Jewel of Africa, due to their prosperity after their independence in 1980. Zimbabwe lost their quote-unquote precious status after being riddled with economic problems and currently has the highest unemployment rate

in the world at 95%. Ocean continues the verse, How could you run off on me? How could you run off on us? It's here where the plot twists as a narrator reveals that Cleopatra has not been kidnapped, but rather ran away on her own accord. He says that she ran off on both me and on us, which seems to imply abandonment of their personal relationship and abandonment of her country, Egypt. Next, Ocean says, you feel like God inside that gold. I found you laying down with Samson and his full head of hair. I believe this refers to Samson, the judge and warrior described in the Old Testament's book of judges.

The name Samson means child of the sun, which helps to clarify that you feel like God inside that gold line. Samson possess incredible physical strength, strength that was granted to him from God through his long hair. Because Cleopatra and Samson lived nearly a thousand years apart, the two could never have crossed paths in real life. We assumed then that ocean is writing metaphorically here, was Samson representative of a man of power and stature to whom Cleopatra was attracted, perhaps alluding to her relationships with Julius Caesar and Mark Antony. The verse ends with the line, I found my black queen Cleopatra,

Bad Dreams, Cleopatra. Here we get too subtle but crucial revelations. The first is that Ocean establishes Cleopatra as a black queen. The ethnicity and skin color of Cleopatra has long been a point of scholarly debate, with really knowing for sure the answer to this mystery. As a result, Cleopatra has been portrayed a myriad of ways throughout history, from the darkest of skin color to the fairest.

What's crucial to the story on pyramids is that Ocean makes it a point to decidedly establish his Cleopatra as black. The second subtle but crucial revelation is the phrase bad dreams. While we can interpret this to mean Cleopatra's betrayal as something like the narrator's quote-unquote worst nightmare, we might also suspect that this entire surreal story being told is actually someone dreaming. It would explain the futuristic Egyptian dance club, the time-warping crossing of Cleopatra and Samson and the overall phantasmic orc feel of the song's first half.

Pyramids continues with another hook, though this time with some very important lyrical changes. The lyrics no other serpent. The lyrics of this altered hook are as follows. Remove her. Send the Cheetahs to the tomb. Our war is over. Our queen has met her doom.

No more. She lives no more. Serpent in her room. No more. He has killed Cleopatra. Our narrator has resigned his search as Cleopatra is dead. Killed by a serpent's bite. This piece of the story loosely resists.

is the common legend that Cleopatra committed suicide by evoking an Egyptian cobra to bite her after learning of Mark Antony's suicide. Of course, it's pretty well established by now that Ocean's use of Cleopatra is not meant to be historically accurate, and we suspect the serpent here is also used metaphorically. We think first of our narrator, and his feelings of betrayal and adultery by Cleopatra. The serpent here becomes representative of sin and temptation, much like it does in the Bible story of Adam and Eve and many other historical legends. A serpent also becomes a clever allusion to a man's penis. This interpretation carries over to the next line. No more, he has killed Cleopatra. Typically, one wouldn't assign a gender to a snake. It has killed Cleopatra. It forces us to consider that the

serpent is being used metaphorically for the man with whom Cleopatra cheated, the man who apparently led to her demise. It also gives an interesting possible double meaning to the opening line of this hook, send the Cheetahs to the tomb. Cheetah, which sounds a lot like cheater, is sent to a tomb, where one is buried after death. Cleopatra, a cheater, is now dead and being sent to a tomb to be buried. This altered hook is followed directly by another performance of the Pyramids theme played on that brassy synthesizer, which now feels right at home over the club-inspired drums and bass. Coming after the dramatic announcement of Cleopatra's death, the pyramid's theme comes to sound a bit more ominous this time around.

I'm going to play the lines leaning up to the riff once more, and this time around, notice the melody ocean sings when announcing the death of Cleopatra. He climbs into an extremely high register, and on the word serpent hits the highest note of the entire song. It's a brilliant display of Ocean's thoughtful, calculated use of melody to enhance the dramatic impact of the story he's telling. Immediately following this passage, we enter the song's middle section, a transportative interlude that features low, hazy sustained chords and arpeggiated synthesizers. Harmonically, the passage begins to shift outside the established F minor key signature the entire first half of the song was set in. By the third and fourth chords, we've entered an entirely new tonal area. The tempo or speed of this section also decreases dramatically, around 40 beats per minute, so much so that we,

temporarily lose our sense of time and pulse and the passage is allowed to float freely, uninhibited by the musical structures established in the song's opening four minutes. With the harmony, tempo, and instrumentation all abruptly changing in this middle section, it's safe to say this bridge is serving a function. What exactly is that function? We'll find that out and a whole lot more in part two of our two-part pyramids extravaganza. Next time on Dysect. Dissect is written and produced by me. Additional project support by Spotify's Michelle Santucci, original theme music by Birocratic. Remember, when you listen to Dissect on Spotify, you'll get new episodes a week before all other

platforms, as well as access to exclusive bonus episodes only available on Spotify. Follow at Dissect Podcast on Twitter and Instagram and follow the official Dissect Spotify user profile for playlist curated by me, as well as collaborative playlist you can contribute to. You can find that by searching Dissect Pod playlist in Spotify. Okay, thanks everyone. Talk to you next week.