You can already stream Pharrell's G I R L album in entirety and the record itself is getting an enthusiastic response. While the cover artwork was criticized, Pharrell made an effort to downplay the controversy saying critics misses his point entirely.
It turns out Pharrell saw this album as an "ode to women, period." He highlighted the hook on his upcoming "Marilyn Monroe," track, detailing the lyrics as: "Not even Marilyn Monroe, Cleopatra, see. Not even Joan of Arc, that don’t mean nothing to me. I just want a different girl.'"
As big as Pharrell is right now, it is hard to imagine that Pharrell was seemingly inactive for a spin before blowing back up again in 2013. The Breakfast Club asked him about this perceived downtime, to which Pharrell responded:
"A lot of the records you're hearing now were records I made about two to three years ago and people weren't necessarily up for them," the hit maker says, "They were mistaking it for being really pastiche and they going 'oh, it's a throwback.' No, it's not a throwback. In fact, there are more 808s and loops in yours. But that's okay, because things will evolve and, you know, people will want to do something different and you just have to wait."
Before ducking out of the interview, Pharrell adds, "and by the way, it's not perfect. You're going to find flaws. You wanna know why? Because I'm a human being, but I hope that at the end of the day, when it all blows away, what's at the bottom of the pot is you're offering my attention."
He continues, "I'm 41, I wasn't going to make this album, I was going to stick with my NERD core, like regional - just continuing producing and, you know, do scoring and that was it. But all of a sudden it's like God came out of nowhere and wanted me to do this record and I instantly knew who I wanted to make this record about and that's the people who have been taking care of me for the last 20 years."
You can listen to the full interview below.