Pharrell Talks With NPR About His Career For A Must-Watch Interview

Pharrell sits down at NYU and speaks about his career in music.

Not Available Lead
Complex Original

Image via Complex Original

Not Available Lead

Pharrell was recently named Artist in Residence at NYU's Tisch  School of the Arts and the "Happy" star made his debut in that role earlier this week with an on-stage interview at the school. During the interview, which spanned almost two hours and included questions from Tisch students in addition to host Jason King, Pharrell went into detail about almost every aspect of his career, speaking about his Virginia Beach roots and earliest attempts at making music. “Chad and Shae and myself, I feel like we were just super blessed," Pharrell said of hisN.E.R.D. collaborators. "The odds are so stacked against you to have a music career in a place where there's virtually no music industry, you know? So I always attribute it to God.”

As for his own illustrious solo career, Pharrell joked, “Honestly, I am like the Mr. Magoo of music." “For whatever reason, these opportunities are presented to me,” he added. “[I think] oh, that will be fun.  And as long as I concentrate on the fun, it usually turns out cool.  It's when I become too, you know, too worried about how it has to be and, you know, that's when, you know, God spends a lot of time chuckling at me.  You know?  He's rolling over laughing all the time with me. He's just like, hey, check him out, there he is again. Watch what we do with him. But when I just let it go and just go with the flow and just do things that I enjoy, I've just had this incredibly eclectic journey of just great opportunities to collaborate with people who were far much more experienced than I was.” 

Watch the whole interview above via NPR (or right here) and check out a snippet of Pharrell's upcoming collaboration with Missy Elliott here.

Latest in Music