Pharrell Williams is not fond of the way his voice sounds on hit track Beautiful.
In an interview for CBS Sunday Morning that aired over the weekend, the music star was asked about his feature on the chart-topping 2003 song by Snoop Dogg.
In response, Pharrell jokingly admitted that he wishes he sounded different on the single.
“I had a song called Beautiful with Snoop. Girls heard me singing that. I heard (Disney character) Mickey Mouse. I swear to you, when you just get a moment, and you just listen, you’ll never be able to unhear it. But that’s what I hear,” he smiled.
Journalist Kelefa Sanneh interjected, “Sexy Mickey Mouse?”
To which the 51-year-old insisted, “No not sexy, just Mickey Mouse. It was wild for me.”
Elsewhere in the conversation, Pharrell reflected on how he “could no longer feel what (he) was doing” following the success of tracks like Beautiful, Nelly’s Hot in Herre and Gwen Stefani’s Hollaback Girl in the early 2000s.
“I had moved away from being a student and things became formulaic, and that was troubling to my spirit,” he explained.
However, Pharrell experienced a renewed sense of creativity in 2013.
He had success with single Happy for the soundtrack of animated movie Despicable Me 2 and also made guest appearances on Daft Punk’s single Get Lucky and Robin Thicke’s track Blurred Lines.
“I would have never written a song called Happy. It was commissioned for me to do, and on top of that, I didn’t think I was gonna have anymore like hit records,” he continued. “The universe was like, well, not only are you wrong about that, but I’m gonna have three different commissions come from three different places, and these are gonna be the biggest records for you. It just humbled me because it was like, I couldn’t be pompous. I couldn’t be arrogant.”
In addition, Pharrell spoke about his role as menswear designer at Louis Vuitton.
But whatever project he takes on, the father-of-four maintained that he always wants to convey “joy”.
“I always want to evoke a sense of joy ’cause I feel like there is a deficit of joy. If you enjoy it, nine times out of 10 somebody else going to enjoy it. You can’t go wrong when your aim is to enjoy what you do,” the superstar added.
