Frank Ocean has canceled his second Coachella appearance scheduled for this weekend, a week after his first appearance – his first live show in six years – leaving many fans disappointed and confused.
A rep for the musician confirmed to Rolling Stone on Wednesday night that the upcoming performance had been canceled because the singer sustained a leg injury in the first week of the festival.
The singer received medical advice not to perform again due to two fractures and a sprain in his left leg, the rep added.
Ocean said: “It was messy. There is beauty in chaos. It’s not what I wanted to show but I’m enjoying being out there and we’ll see you soon.”
Blink-182 is set to take on Ocean’s headlining spot, Variety reported.
Ocean’s headlining performance at Coachella last Sunday was his first show since 2017. He was originally set to headline the 2020 festival before the pandemic hit, and it was pushed back to 2023. But the much-anticipated performance began to provoke trouble when it was announced it would not be streamed live on Coachella’s YouTube channel, unlike other performances.
The singer took the stage one hour after his scheduled start time at around 11pm local time. He omitted several hits and used a vocal track for others, openly playing along.
The show then ended abruptly due to the festival’s strict midnight curfew, with Ocean briefly walking off stage before returning to announce the end of the show.
Reports have since surfaced that Ocean was originally scheduled to perform at a purpose-built ice rink with more than 100 skaters surrounding him. But the stage was dismantled just hours before the performance when it became apparent Ocean’s injury would not allow him to perform safely on the ice. Instead, 30 of the skaters paced the stage in custom-made Prada outfits and face paint.
Dan and Chris Powers, brothers and former hockey players who say they were hired for the performance, said Thursday they rehearsed for the show with about 120 other skaters in Los Angeles for a month and attended a successful dress rehearsal at Coachella, only most of them were told hours before the show that their services were no longer needed.
“Those skaters were cut, not because there was an ice problem, not because something was wrong,” Dan Powers said on the brothers’ podcast, Empty Netters. “There was no disturbance. [Ocean] was just like, ‘Fuck it. I do not do this anymore.’ And [to] These 120 people [he] When he drove out of here he just said, ‘You guys don’t give a fuck.’ So it was like a wild flip.”
When the brothers arrived for wardrobe and makeup, they ran into some Olympic figure skaters. “They have an angry expression on their face and casually mention to us that they just got a call and got kicked off the show. So we’re sitting there, like, what the hell is happening right now?
“These Olympians just got kicked out of that Coachella performance with Frank Ocean, and they think we’re going to move on? You’re saying goodbye to those skaters, but a bunch of shitty ex-hockey players are gonna get on stage and buzz around? So we already get bad vibes here.”
The brothers said they were told at 4pm that organizers were “trying to rip this rink stage out face down because they don’t want anyone to know it was there”.
But both praised Ocean’s dedication during rehearsals, with Chris Powers saying, “He really cares about the production. He had a very clear vision and even though that vision changed a lot, he was always with us, helping us and making sure everyone hit what they had in mind.”
Ocean and its reps have not responded to questions about the original plans for the show. The singer, who released his last album Blonde in 2016, last released new music in 2020: two tracks, Dear April and Cayendo.
The headline and subheading of this article were changed on April 20, 2023 to include information about Frank Ocean’s injuries.