Blood Orange, a.k.a. Devonté Hynes, has achieved his first award from the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA).
The alt-R&B artist’s 2011 single “Champagne Coast” has received a gold certification. The self-penned track has sold over 500,000 equivalent units in the U.S.
Blood Orange co-produced “Champagne Coast” with Ariel Rechtshaid. The song has over 180 million streams on Spotify, his most-streamed track on that platform to date.
“Champagne Coast” is lifted from his debut album, Coastal Grooves. (It was his first project under his Blood Orange moniker. The English singer, songwriter, and producer previously went by Lightspeed Champion.)
Coastal Grooves was released Aug. 30, 2011, via Domino Records. The label described the album as “the music of a seedy yet inspirational New York night time.”
Blood Orange further explained the album’s inspiration, informed by New York’s ballroom scene, in a 2013 interview with The Fader. “Here were these queer black men figuring out how to express themselves,” he said. “They were free.”
In 2011, Blood Orange revealed that the songs on the album were written in 2009. He held onto them because he didn’t want to put it out.
“A couple of years ago, I was just writing in my downtime from working on other people stuff which I was doing a lot. Lawrence from Domino Records heard this stuff and he was the one that wanted to put them out,” Blood Orange told Under The Radar.
He added, “Originally, I didn’t want to release anything ever again, I was just tired of the industry and just wanted to give music to my friends, or just listen to it myself. But yeah that’s why it took a couple of years from that point because I decided to re-record a bunch of stuff.”
It’s been nearly six years since Blood Orange released a full-length project. In 2019, he released his Angel’s Pulse mixtape. The project included features from Tinashe, Justine Skye, Project Pat, and Gangsta Boo, among others.
In 2022, Blood Orange returned with Four Songs, a four-track project released via RCA Records. The EP included the lead single “Jesus Freak Lighter.”
It’s worth noting Devonté Hynes teamed with musician Adam Tendler in 2024 for “Morning Piece,” an 11-minute ambient track featured on Tendler’s album Inheritances. A year prior, Hynes helmed the Master Gardener soundtrack.
Revisit Blood Orange’s “Champagne Coast” below.
