Williams and Hugo are also known as the Grammy-winning production duo The Neptunes.
N*E*R*D's sound is a blend of rock, hip-hop, and R&B. N*E*R*D stands for "No-one Ever Really Dies".
Williams and Hugo originally recorded the band's debut album, In Search Of..., for European release in 2001 using similar digital production techniques used on Neptunes-produced records. However, they decided that if N*E*R*D was to be different from The Neptunes, it should sound different. This led to them re-recording the album (still titled In Search Of...) with the power pop band Spymob for worldwide release in 2002.
In Search Of... achieved moderate success in the United States.: the album reached number 59 on the Billboard 200; its first single, Lapdance, reached the top 40 on the rap charts; and its second single, Rock Star, reached the top 40 of the modern rock charts in the US and is still incredibly popular today. "Lapdance" also went top 40 in the Netherlands and its music video received heavy airplay on American MTV2. The album was well-received by critics even though it was not as successful as many of the Neptunes' productions for other artists.
The album won the second annual Shortlist Music Prize, awarded (by a group of musicians, journalists, and other music professionals) for Best Album that had sold less than 500,000 copies at the time of nomination. The band performed at the show, bragging that the week prior to the ceremony, the album had, in fact, achieved gold status by selling over 500,000 units.
Fly or Die
The band recorded their second album Fly or Die during 2003. The band actually learned to play the tunes live, as Chad Hugo told MTV News on December 9, 2003: "We're the ones playing the instruments live this time. "I just started playing guitar last year so I'm learning as we go. Pharrell's playing drums. [Last time] we didn't have time to learn certain instruments so we got Spymob to help us out."
The band also recruited some assistance to record the album with Lenny Kravitz playing on the track Maybe (which has been featured in ads for XM Satellite Radio) and Joel Madden and Benji Madden of Good Charlotte playing on the track Jump. Several of the tracks discuss issues of particular concern to adolescents, for example Thrasher, which is about bullies; Drill Sergeant, about rebellion; and Backseat Love, which talks about first love.
Fly or Die went on sale on March 22, 2004. The album went top 10 in the USA, while the lead-off single, She Wants to Move, went top 5 in the UK, top 20 in Norway, Ireland, and Denmark, and top 30 in Australia and top 40 in the USA and the Netherlands. The music videos for "She Wants To Move" and its followup single, "Maybe", received strong support from music video stations globally.
In 2005, N.E.R.D ended their contract with Virgin Records. After becoming "hooked" on the energy from their fans, the band began recording their third studio album, spending their own money. Williams and Hugo later established Star Trak Entertainment, a subsidiary of Interscope Records.
Seeing Sounds
The third album from N*E*R*D is called Seeing Sounds. The album's title, as well as its content, revolves around the neurological phenomenon of synesthesia, the mixing of sensory modalities. After touring in promotion of their previous album, Fly or Die, N.E.R.D felt that album was too consistent. For their following album, they wanted to create the atmosphere of hyperactivity they knew their fans wanted.
The album debuted at number seven on the Billboard 200, selling 80,000 in its first week. It received mixed reviews, with critics lauding the production of the album. Some writers called the record N.E.R.D's best album to date, while others criticized Williams' singing and the album's content.
The album was released on June 10, 2008. The first single off the album, titled "Everyone Nose (All the Girls Standing in the Line for the Bathroom)" featured a video with fans as well as stars like Lindsay Lohan and Kanye West. In June 2008, the second single off the album, titled "Spaz", was used in a TV commercial for the Microsoft Zune. The third single "Sooner or Later" featured a video dedicated to America's economic crisis.
Nothing
In 2010, N.E.R.D announced the release of their fourth studio album entitled Nothing, which had a scheduled release date for September 7, 2010, but was pushed back to November 2, 2010. The first single from the album, "Hot-n-Fun" featuring Canadian recording artist Nelly Furtado, was released on May 18, 2010, on iTunes. It was released in the United Kingdom on August 30, 2010. On August 20, 2010, a track titled "Party People" leaked onto the internet. It was rumored to be the second single from the album. On September 28, 2010, they premiered another track from the album titled "Hypnotize U" on Late Show with David Letterman, produced by electronic music duo Daft Punk. On September 30, 2010, in an interview with Mark Hoppus on A Different Spin with Mark Hoppus, Pharrell explained the album cover as "a mix of so many things. The feathers represent the peace, and the helmet represents the war. It's like where we are right now. There's a lot of war, that people can't necessarily explain. The economy sucks, girls are still beautiful. We wanted to make music that reflected that. So people can look back twenty years from now, and say 'this is what was going on'". They then announced in the interview that the next two singles would be "I've Seen the Light" and "Hypnotize U". Pharrell described "Hypnotize U" as being "so different from the rest of the album", stating he was "very pleased because it serves a different purpose" in the album. On October 17, 2010, the standard edition and the deluxe edition of the album became available for pre-order on iTunes. Nothing debuted at number twenty one on the US Billboard 200 chart, with first-week sales of 20,000 copies.
The albums concept was to create a time capsule about America's divisions, "so that ten years from now people remember that era." Sonically the album was inspired by the late 60's and early 70's psychedelic pop.
Pharrell explained: "I just wanted to make some good music that would affect people in a good way." Williams says it wasn't easy. N*E*R*D worked on "a previous body of work which was really good, but it wasn't timeless to me. I didn't feel like we were pushing ourselves as much as we could. We needed to perfect the sound, so we kept pushing the date back until it was right." The result includes "a lot of vintage sounds...The album is very '68-'72, '73, America meets Crosby, Stills & Nash meets Moody Blues."
Nothing received mixed to positive reviews from most music critics.
NO_ONE EVER REALLY DIES
In 2013, Pharrell confirmed a N.E.R.D album was in progress, but also mentioned that the album would not be released that year due to the projects he was working on with other artists. He has also said the album will be "nature-based". The group reunited on December 26, 2014, to release the songs "Squeeze Me," "Patrick Star," and "Sandy Squirrel" for the film The SpongeBob Movie: Sponge Out of Water.
On February 6, 2017, during an interview with BBC Radio 1, Pharrell stated that "it's feeling really good, really special" about the group's return.
In October 2017, the album was teased after posters were popping up on the side of streets, and by concertgoers at the 2017 Camp Flog Gnaw Carnival.
It was preceded by three singles; "Lemon" with Rihanna, "1000" with Future, and "Don't Don't Do It!" with Kendrick Lamar.
The album was debuted with a live listening party during the first day at ComplexCon, thus revealing the tracklist. Pharrell revealed the album's cover art and release date via Instagram and Twitter on November 22, 2017.
NO_ONE EVER REALLY DIES was released on December 15, 2017 through I Am Other and Columbia Records. It features guest appearances from Rihanna, André 3000, Kendrick Lamar, M.I.A., Gucci Mane, Wale, Future and Ed Sheeran among others. The album presented a radical change in sound compared to Nothing, heavily influenced by 80's New Wave and Post-Punk.
“Mr. Williams had been listening to the nervy jangle of post-punk and avant-punk: Gang of Four, Suicide, Devo, Talking Heads,” the Times reported in a December profile. “Once I identified all my pieces,” Williams said, “I was like, ‘Yo, I don’t want to make any more linear songs.’ ” N.E.R.D’s fifth album, “NO ONE EVER REALLY DIES,” released in December, delights in the aimless, anything-plays spirit of post-punk and New Wave—an era that Pharrell, Chad Hugo, and Shay Haley watched firsthand as students of nineteen-eighties MTV."
To make sense of “NO ONE EVER REALLY DIES,” it helps to spend time with the cartoonish yelps of Devo’s Mark Mothersbaugh on “Uncontrollable Urge” or David Byrne on “Life During Wartime.” Those front men both shout-sing somewhere higher than mid-range; Byrne has mentioned that, on “Once in a Lifetime,” he evoked the quivering timbre of a southern evangelical preacher whom he’d taped off of local radio. Fans are used to Pharrell’s many voices: the falsetto made famous on “Frontin’,” the breezy and conversational way that he rapped on “Mr. Me Too,” even the showman croon on “Happy.” But this latest voice, on such tracks as “Rollinem 7’s” and “ESP,” searches for a slightly goofball tone that offsets stone-serious messages, like “What possessed the slave to look in the river / Then he saw his true master, fuck is a ‘mister’?” and “Detach yourself, repack yourself / Be back yourself, and dream as yourself.” Many music fans winced at the sight of the new album’s credits, worried that its several guest slots meant a muddy, scattered N.E.R.D. project, but the most unexpected voice on it belongs to Pharrell, who finds new angles for his instrument almost fifteen years in.
This shape-shifting extends to the album’s production, an unrelenting tangle of stuttering rhythms, tempo changes, bridges, and every other misdirection the band can jam in. “Lemon,” the opening track, is the most generous to pop form, and “Deep Down Body Thurst” takes traditional N.E.R.D. piano chords and lays them under new, challenging shapes. You can hear shades of the song’s stomping guitar in the English Beat’s “Mirror in the Bathroom,” itself a mutation of the ska sound that took hold in the U.K. “Don’t Don’t Do It!” pushes through its hook in the same fashion: while the verses are smooth and bluesy, the chorus bursts open in three steamy riffs. (“Don’t, don’t do it!” “They’re gonna do it anyway!” “They. Are. Go-nna. Do. It anyway!”) “Kites” is just as sprawling, bobbing between a double-time punk stomp and trunk-melting trap as Kendrick Lamar and M.I.A. vent about flying over borders and walls on both ends of the beat.
NO_ONE EVER REALLY DIES received positive reviews from music critics.
Kill Joy
N*E*R*D Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
Everybody let's go!
Little, Red, Riding, Hood, went riding on her bike
She got just a little distracted 'cause she see something she liked
Just because it ain't grandma's house don't mean that it's all good
'Cause no one cares, if she's in there, and the wolf's still in the woods
To you they might look beautiful, but they're rotten in the inside
(Beautiful losers)
When there's so much dirt up under the cupboard
There's a big ol' lump that can't hide, c'mon!
Here they go again, wearing disguises to a friend
Watch the bullets ricochet, off of the Hummer like
Blam ba blam, blam ba blam, hey hey
You know they won't succeed, you know relentless they will be
You should tell 'em clear the way
And tell 'em to step back, back ba back, hey hey!
[Chorus]
Kill joy, kill joy, a kill joy, a kill joy
Watch them bullets ricochet like
Blam ba blam, blam blam ba blam blam
Kill joy
Everybody let's go!
Think back when you've met them, you'll see it in their glances
That's the seed, that led to trees, which eventually led to branches
Cold, as a snowball, downhill to avalanches
Believe you me when the world is coldest when the devil does his dances
(Beautiful losers)
Don't you wonder why, you always end up in last?
(Beautiful losers)
Well I will bet you anything, that it's come up from you past
Wake up little boy, there's no spaceship here employed
Cause that they shut away, like
Damn da damn, damn da damn, hey hey
You're impoverished at your knees
But you gotta stand up and face the fees
And that's when you say, get your shoulder up
Dap ta dap, dap ta dap, hey hey
[Chorus]
Ahh, hah, ha-ha ha-UHH-ah [Repeat: x 4]
Everybody let's go!
[echoes]
Kill joy
An N-E-R-D film, starring... YOU!
Also starring, HIM
Color provided by, "Seeing Sounds"
Good night
Ahh-Aww!!!
The lyrics to N*E*R*D's "Kill Joy" explore the theme of deceit and betrayal. The opening lines are a call to action, urging everyone to join in, before giving us the cautionary tale of Little Red Riding Hood. The lyrics suggest that just because something may look good on the outside, doesn't mean it is on the inside. This theme is then extended to the chorus, where the idea of a kill joy is introduced. The kill joy represents those who are out to ruin the fun and happiness of others. The verses then go on to describe how these people operate, often hiding behind disguises and manipulations. However, the lyrics also encourage listeners to be strong and to face up to the challenges these people present. The song ends with an invitation to the listener to become the star of their own movie, with the "color provided by 'Seeing Sounds'".
Overall, the lyrics to "Kill Joy" are an ode to strength and resilience in the face of deceit and betrayal. They acknowledge that such people and situations exist, but also encourage people to not let them get in the way of their happiness and fun.
Line by Line Meaning
Little, Red, Riding, Hood, went riding on her bike
The story of Little Red Riding Hood is used as a metaphor for a naive person (represented by Little Red Riding Hood) who is unaware of potential danger.
She got just a little distracted 'cause she see something she liked
The naive person is easily swayed and influenced by shiny objects, or things that seem appealing without considering the negative consequences.
Just because it ain't grandma's house don't mean that it's all good
Just because something looks safe or familiar, it doesn't mean that it is free of danger or malicious intent.
'Cause no one cares, if she's in there, and the wolf's still in the woods
People who are self-centered or have ulterior motives can easily take advantage of those who are not paying attention or are vulnerable.
(Beautiful losers)
People who appear to be attractive or successful may have deep-seated issues or problems that are not immediately visible.
To you they might look beautiful, but they're rotten in the inside
People can be deceiving, and appearances can be misleading.
When there's so much dirt up under the cupboard
When there is a lot of hidden or unknown information or problems.
There's a big ol' lump that can't hide, c'mon!
There is a large problem that needs to be addressed.
Here they go again, wearing disguises to a friend
People who are not truthful or honest often hide their true intentions behind a facade or disguise.
Watch the bullets ricochet, off of the Hummer like
The bullets represent negative or harmful actions or consequences, and the Hummer represents a symbol of wealth or power that people may use to try and deflect or avoid them.
Blam ba blam, blam ba blam, hey hey
The sound of the bullets ricocheting off the Hummer.
You know they won't succeed, you know relentless they will be
People who are committed to deception or malicious behavior are unlikely to succeed, but they will continue to try anyway.
You should tell 'em clear the way
People should be warned to stay away or avoid interacting with those who have negative intentions or tendencies.
And tell 'em to step back, back ba back, hey hey!
Again, people should be warned to distance themselves from those who have hidden or negative intentions.
[Chorus]
The chorus repeats the phrase 'kill joy' which can be interpreted as encouraging listeners to identify and confront those who have negative intentions.
Think back when you've met them, you'll see it in their glances
Hindsight is often 20/20, and it's easier to see warning signs in retrospect.
That's the seed, that led to trees, which eventually led to branches
Small signs or behaviors can quickly snowball into larger problems or issues, which may have many different branches or complexities.
Cold, as a snowball, downhill to avalanches
Negative actions or intentions can quickly build momentum and lead to disastrous consequences.
Believe you me when the world is coldest when the devil does his dances
When things are difficult or uncertain, people with negative intentions may become more aggressive or destructive.
Don't you wonder why, you always end up in last?
People who are prone to negative interactions or relationships may find themselves in unfavorable situations repeatedly.
Well I will bet you anything, that it's come up from you past
Past experiences or traumas may influence people's actions or perceptions, leading them to engage in negative behaviors or relationships.
Wake up little boy, there's no spaceship here employed
People should stop living in unrealistic or idealized worlds and face the reality of their situations.
Cause that they shut away, like
People are encouraged to stop ignoring or suppressing negative aspects of their lives or personalities.
Damn da damn, damn da damn, hey hey
A soundscape or beat that adds to the overall rhythm of the song.
You're impoverished at your knees
People may feel powerless or helpless in difficult situations.
But you gotta stand up and face the fees
People must take responsibility for their actions and the consequences of those actions.
And that's when you say, get your shoulder up
People must take action and face challenges head-on with strength and determination.
Dap ta dap, dap ta dap, hey hey
A soundscape or beat that adds to the overall rhythm of the song.
[Chorus]
The chorus repeats the phrase 'kill joy' which can be interpreted as encouraging listeners to identify and confront those who have negative intentions.
[echoes]
An audio effect used to add atmosphere to the end of the song.
Kill joy
The phrase repeated throughout the chorus which encourages listeners to confront and overcome negativity.
An N-E-R-D film, starring... YOU!
The song encourages listeners to take charge of their own lives and actions.
Also starring, HIM
The song may also be referring to God or a higher power as a partner in people's journeys.
Color provided by, "Seeing Sounds"
The song encourages people to pay closer attention to the subtler aspects of their lives and relationships.
Good night
A polite and formal ending to the song.
Ahh-Aww!!!
A sound effect that adds to the overall rhythm and style of the song.
Lyrics © Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC, Warner Chappell Music, Inc.
Written by: PHARRELL WILLIAMS
Lyrics Licensed & Provided by LyricFind