Boys don't cry, but Frank Ocean fans most certainly do. Thanks to an Internet rumor that spun out of control, Twitter was fairly certain that Ocean would release his new album — allegedly titled Boys Don't Cry — on Friday, June 3. This would be Ocean's second studio album after his acclaimed debut in 2012 with Channel Orange, but it turns out that the rumor was just that since no new music was released by Ocean on this fateful Friday morning.
It's no wonder Ocean fans were so gullible to believe that he was releasing new music since the artist himself insinuated through hashtags that Boys Don't Cry would come out in July 2015. Although almost a full year has passed since the promise of #JULY2015, the Internet was just as susceptible as ever to think that this time the release date of June 3, 2016 could be real. It also doesn't help that in the four years since Channel Orange, Ocean's only other albums have been a compilation entitled unreleased, MISC and the mixtape album Lonny Breaux, Pt. 1 . If you want a full look at the scale of desperation and deceit when it comes to information about Ocean's second original album, Fuse created a thorough timeline of all the album hype, starting back in 2013.
So, what happened? How did this rumor of Ocean's second album release date get so out of control? Well, Complex credits this unfounded rumor to the Twitter account Snatched Bops, which posted on June 1 this fairly convincing tweet about Ocean's new album being released on June 3. (I mean, they put "officially" in all caps, so how could this tweet not have been legit??)
Considering it was the account's first tweet ever and they had less than 700 followers at the time of this article being published, it was pretty clear to me that Snatched Bops was not a reputable source. Yet, once the rumor was out there, it was out there and there was no stopping fans from considering the slight possibility that Ocean could be releasing new music on June 3 — even if many people were wary.
Considering that fans have been wanting a new album from Ocean pretty much instantly after hearing Channel Orange, no amount of false release date information is going to quell that desire. And though this June 3 rumor should be viewed as a warning that you shouldn't get your hopes up to hear new music until that music has actually been released by Ocean, I know the tide of desperation will remain unchanged.
