Live long and prosper
A galaxy of stars align on rap royalty’s fifth bold adventure.
N*E*R*D No–One Ever Really Dies
FEW DOUBT that Pharrell Williams has the Midas touch. Ever since the avid Star Trek fan united with multi-instrumentalist Chad Hugo in the early ’90s, The Neptunes morphed into an unprecedented hit factory, spearheading hiphop’s US chart takeover like a mutant Motown via squelching bass, zooming synths and propulsive percussion vamps. Beyond the cold cash boons of forging distinctive blockbusters for Kelis, Jay-Z, Madonna, Britney Spears et al, billionaire fashion icon Williams parlayed his gifts into soundtracks, jewellery, furniture and sundry streetwear brands. Happy? He should be ecstatic. There is a chink in the gilded armour, however. With the exception of two exemplary production jobs for Clipse, Williams has failed to preside over a gold-standard full-length. N*E*R*D, his experimental three-way affair with Hugo and drummer Shae Haley, has come closest via sporadic dispatches that have explored re-juiced ’70s funk, jazz, rock and, on 2010’s Nothing, whiffy, spliffy whacked-out psychedelia. The sense this fifth outing is more Neptunes than N*E*R*D is palpable from the credits: Williams largely pulling back from the vocal frontline and sending in the cavalry. It works a treat on its early big-hitters: the seismically bouncy Lemon, showcasing their indefinable knack for building a heady beat chassis (à la Ol’ Dirty Bastard’s Got Your Money) while suiting Rihanna’s coolly swaggering, acidic rap to a T; the rhythms are similarly on-point amid the skewed pop of Voilà, although they perhaps missed a chorus trick by not augmenting Gucci Mane’s pitched-up cartoonish yelps with Raymond Blanc. The organic, live-sounding N*E*R*D circa 2001’s debut In Search Of… resurface on Deep Down Body Thirst and Don’t Don’t Do It. The first is an addictive booty-shaker whose fournote motif quickly builds into a hot funkin’ stomp peppered with strategic “Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey!” chants, the latter cleverly melds a supersmooth Labi Siffre-like slow jam with nu-metal guitar breaks before being blown apart by an arresting 30-second Kendrick Lamar visitation. Much of the remainder genre-hopscotches with hit-and-miss disregard: André 3000’s dumb but fun refrains (Rollinem 7s) knocking Future’s kinetically blustering Hokey Cokey innuendos (1000) into a cocked Vivienne Westwood Buffalo hat. If the quirky ’80s electro riff driving Secret Life Of Tigers rocks the party spot, ESP resembles reheated leftovers from 2004’s Snoop Dogg hit Drop It Like It’s Hot, while the overlong Lightning Fire Magic Prayer is a self-indulgent cod-mystic R&B-prog fusion yawn-fest. The appeal of Lifting You is more selective still, entirely dependent on listeners’ tolerance for Williams and Ed Sheeran meshing their keening falsettos atop a lilting, lovers rock weed hymnal. Despite the recruitment drive, it’s another curious case of history repeating itself: N*E*R*D setting their phasers to stun, but only intermittently finding the target.