It appears that Chad Hugo’s retirement from music has been greatly exaggerated: He said this summer that he was all done, and yet, over the past few days, rumors about N.E.R.D.’s return have really started to gain steam. There were a bunch of posters that read “No_one Ever Really Dies” at Tyler, The Creator’s Flog Naw festival this past weekend, which lent themselves to rumors of the group’s re-emergence. Then yesterday, there were cryptic tweets from Pharrell Williams and Zane Lowe telling people to tune into Lowe’s Beats 1 Apple Radio show today at noon ET.
Well, noon ET has come and gone, and what we’re left with is this: N.E.R.D. is back, and their return is heralded by the new Rihanna-featuring single, “Lemon.” It’s their first new song since their 2010 album Nothing.
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The bouncy track is also accompanied by a video starring Rihanna, in which she shaves a woman’s hair clean off, which was apparently necessary prep for that women to twerk and dance around in a swap meet after hours, which is what happens during the rest of the video. It’s a completely appropriate response to the song, though, since it’s definitely one meant to get bodies moving, and it does that very well.
Watch the “Lemon” video above.
