Justin Bieber Defends Frank Ocean’s ‘Disappointing’ Coachella Set: ‘I Was Blown Away’

Justin Bieber is coming to the defense of Frank Ocean. The "Peaches" singer, 29, shared a photo of Ocean's Coachella stage set up on Instagram and wrote a lengthy post praising the artist for his performance, after Ocean, 35, received backlash from fans following his show at the popular music festival. 

Bieber wrote, "I was blown away by Frank Ocean's Coachella performance. His artistry is simply unmatched, his style, his taste, his voice, his attention to detail... I was deeply moved. It made me want to keep going and get better as an artist. He continues to set the bar high and gave me a night I will never forget! Thanks, Frank."

The photo he shared was of an audience view of the Coachella stage where a video of Ocean was playing on the screens. Several people could be seen in the crowd holding their phones up as they recorded videos.

Ocean headlined Coachella 2023 along with Bad Bunny and Blackpink, but his April 16 set proved to be a massive disappointment for fans after he started an hour late, skipped over many fan-favorite songs, performed mostly sitting down and with his back to the crowd, and lip-synced to several tracks.

He also ran past the Coachella curfew and abruptly ended his set after less than 90 minutes. The "Novacane" singer started his set about one hour late, just before 11 PM, and had to abruptly end the show at 12:20 AM due to the festival's "curfew." Ocean's performance was also notably not played on YouTube's official Coachella live stream, unlike Bad Bunny and Black Pink. 

"What do u mean frank ocean's set won't be on the livestream," one Twitter user wrote, with a GIF from "Family Guy." Another fan added, "the fans are gonna come for me but this frank ocean tiny desk concert as a headliner at coachella is not it."

Sources confirmed to Variety that Ocean’s performance was dramatically overhauled in the hours leading up to its start, which may account for why the set felt so off. An elaborate stage production involving an ice rink was constructed, while a group of skaters — who would apparently skate around Ocean and the band during their set — rehearsed for several days and were ready to go until Ocean allegedly called it all off on Sunday afternoon with just hours to go before taking the stage.

Reports from TMZ and Rolling Stone claim that Ocean's performance "was adjusted at the last minute to account for an ankle injury the singer sustained during on-site rehearsals in the week leading up to the festival," which could explain why Ocean was seated for a lot of his set.

At this time, Ocean is still scheduled to close out Coachella's second weekend with a performance on April 23.