If you haven’t heard ‘Blurred Lines’ yet – heck, we’re not even mad. That’s amazing. One of the year’s biggest hits, it has taken the world by storm and thrown a certain Robin Thicke into worldwide superstardom – thanks in part to a particularly risqué music video. We caught up with Mr Thicke recently to talk about how he feels about his new found fame and, of course, that video…
Although ‘Blurred Lines’ was your first global hit, you’ve been releasing music for over a decade – It must feel like it’s been a long time coming?
You work so hard and you always think that maybe this will be the song and that will be the song, and then when it finally happens you just have this big cheesy smile on your face the whole time. I’m just enjoying every second and I always hoped when we made the record that, y’know, I feel like this could be a good crossover song. I think that I always thought it could be a pop song and to actually see it go No.1 in forty countries is way too good to be true. It’s like the biggest cherry on top of an already very happy cake.
You’ve written songs for the likes of Christina Aguilera and Usher – do you prefer writing for yourself or for other people?
I haven’t written for anyone else the last ten years because once I was able to sing my own music then I didn’t have to compromise anymore, ’cause when you’re writing for someone else you’re worried about what they want to say or what they don’t want to say or what style of music they want… but I think the fun thing about it is the money.
You teamed up with Pharrell Williams for ‘Blurred Lines’ – how was he to work with?
Well Pharrell and I we did the song last summer, almost a year ago we wrote the song and I was holding onto it as I was working on the album, trying to figure it out and then my manager and a few other people that I know well were like “I think that Blurred Lines song is my favourite one on the new album you’ve got,” and my manager was like “I think we should put it out.” And then once we shot the video and of course everyone got it and everyone thought it was a smash and we just got lucky.
You’ve said that you deliberately tried to fill the video with taboo subjects – did you not worry that it could backfire on you?
It was amazing to shoot, the girls were so loveable and funny and had great sense of humour. The idea for the nudity was actually the directors’, I just told her that I wanted the video to be very funny, like Benny Hill, so it’s very silly – and then she goes, “well what if the girls are nude?” And I was like… “That could work,” haha. Then we agreed that we would have a whole bunch of props, so the props ended up being sausages, a lamb, a taxidermy dog, an enormous syringe. We wanted to do everything you’re not supposed to. Cigarette smoking, nudity, we wanted to put it all in there.
My wife actually came up with a lot of the great ideas, like the needle and the car going down the girls back – the wonderful thing about my wife is she’s always an artist first and a wife second, so she supported the video, came up with great ideas and then when she saw the video she wanted to watch it about 10 times in a row. And then she jumped my bones so it obviously had a positive effect.
What can we expect from your upcoming album?
Soul music has to be more serious because you’re digging deep and you’re trying to talk about your life and your issues and your addictions, your problems – and you’re trying to find a way to get through those problems. That’s what a lot of my music has been, if I get through the tough times, but with this album instead of just talking about it I decided to just make a very fun, lighthearted album that helps us get through the tough times but doesn’t have to mention how tough they are.
Listen to an exclusive playlist of Robin Thicke’s favourite tracks on Deezer below:
