N.E.R.D.'s first concert in over six years turned into a surprise listening party for their upcoming new album 'No_One Ever Really Dies.' Photo: Frank Schwichtenberg/Wikimedia Commons/CC-BY-SA-4.0
N.E.R.D.’s first concert in over six years turned into a surprise listening party for their upcoming new album as Pharrell Williams and company debuted No_One Ever Really Dies at ComplexCon in Long Beach, California.
The album, the Neptunes project’s first since 2010’s Nothing, boasts first single “Lemon” with Rihanna as well as guests like Kendrick Lamar, Andre 3000, Future, Ed Sheeran, Gucci Mane and more, Complex reports.
Lamar, who collaborated with Pharrell on To Pimp a Butterfly‘s “Alright,” features on a pair of No_One Ever Really Dies, “Kites” with fellow guest M.I.A. and “Don’t Don’t Do It,” which Pharrell told the audience was inspired by the police shooting death of Keith Lamont Scott in September 2016.
“I just know that for all those unarmed motorists that’s been killed, I know there’s a moment when they tell them to do something there must be a voice in their heads saying, ‘Don’t don’t do it,'” Williams said.
For the “concert,” N.E.R.D.’s Williams, Chad Hugo and Shay Haley sat atop a van surrounded by dancers as the venue’s speakers blasted the new album, which doesn’t yet have a release date. “The album’s not coming out tomorrow,” Williams told the crowd. “We’re giving it to you. It’s yours. You got it before everybody else.”
No_One Ever Really Dies Track List (via Complex)
1. “Deep Down Body Thirst”
2. “Lemon” featuring Rihanna
3. “Voilà ” featuring Gucci Mane and Wale
4. “1000” featuring Future
5. “Don’t Don’t Do It” featuring Kendrick Lamar
6. “Kites” featuring Kendrick Lamar and M.I.A.
7. “ESP”
8. “Lightning Fire Magic Prayer”
9. “Rollinem 7’s” featuring André 3000
10. “Lifting You” featuring Ed Sheeran
11. “Secret Life of Tigers”
