It might seem crazy what we’re about to say: Pharrell Williams, the ageless 40-year-old mega-producer, is about to have his biggest year yet. GQ’s Zach Baron spent a few days in the once and future Neptune’s orbit to find out why—after years of hit-making and money-raking—Pharrell says he’s just now figured it all out. Clap along, everybody.
G I R L isn’t his first solo record, he reminds me. That came in 2006. The year he made singles for Gwen Stefani, Ludacris, and Beyoncé, among others. He put out his own long-awaited, flamboyantly braggadocious rap record, In My Mind, and—“Crickets,” he says. He got outsold by Destiny’s Child exile LeToya Luckett and a ****ing compilation, Now That’s What I Call Music! 22. It was baffling—a guy who could make a hit for an Ikea shelving unit couldn’t make a hit for himself.
Except Pharrell is no longer baffled by it at all. “I wrote those songs out of ego,” he says. “Talking about the money I was making and the by-products of living that lifestyle. What was good about that? What’d you get out of it? There was no purpose. I was so under the wrong impression at that time.”
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