Picking up 2018 with a major theme of 2017….Black musicians and artists releasing songs about police harassment, persistent racism, and the frustration/outrage/pain of the inequity and inequality that still defines the Black experience in America. #Black Lives Matter.
This time, it’s Pharrell Williams and his side-project, N.E.R.D, who released a new album right at the end of 2017. Pharrell’s work (solo and otherwise) is consistently hit-or-miss for me. But, I love this track; it’s production and construction, the mash-up of genres, and it’s political lyrics and message. It starts out sounding like a Stevie Wonder track, adds in a few power chords, a bit of a ska beat, and then ends with a rapid-fire rhyme from the mighty Kendrick Lamar.
In My Ear 