14 DAY TRIAL // In a weird twist of fate that is lately so common in the music industry, it's been revealed that “Happy,” one of the most famous and most liked songs of the year, was originally composed by Cee Lo Green and was supposed to be featured on his album, but it somehow landed in Pharrell Williams' lap.
We've all heard the song, some of us might even sang in tune with the radio and others might have even danced frantically when no one was watching, but no one had an inkling that Pharrell's dance anthem was originally supposed to be sung by the former Gnarls Barkley singer, Cee Lo Green.
The story comes from Pharrell himself who told it in an interview with Howard Stern just recently. The radio DJ asked Pharrell whether he would have ever given the song to some other singer, “to a Robin Thicke or someone?”
Williams candidly replied “I actually did, [to] Cee Lo,” and added that “He sounded amazing on it. I mean, he burns my version! But the ... how do I say this diplomatically? Um ... he ... um ... The powers that be, at the time, did not see it fit for him. Some folks on his team just felt that the priority should be on [Cee Lo's] album at the time, so they elected not to do that song.”
He goes on to explain how the song fell to him in the end, “There was a much bigger agenda for [Cee Lo], he had an album to put out. It's not his fault – he was totally down with it … [and] he was one of the most gracious people about it when [Happy] came out.”
Now that Pharrell has taken the song to a whole new level of popularity, it has also become the centerpiece to his new solo album, as well as appearing on the soundtrack of the computer animation movie “Despicable Me 2.”
It was so good that it went on to earn Grammy and Oscar nominations, a fact that didn't hurt its sales in the least. Quite the contrary, since the song has spent week after week atop the charts and not just in America, but elsewhere in the world too.
This might seem like an odd thing to do, turn down a song with awesome hit potential, but those that have some knowledge of the music industry will know that this is not an isolated occurrence. Many hit songs made famous by less popular acts were originally destined for big singers.
Also, since the music industry and its market is so volatile, one can't say for sure that Cee Lo's version of “Happy” would have had the same success that Pharrell's version did.
Take a listen to the full interview below (which is over an hour long), but be advised that there is some strong language present, since hey, this is Howard Stern we're talking about here.
