N*E*R*D Drops New Kendrick Lamar and Frank Ocean Collab "Don't Don't Do It!"

The new N*E*R*D album is out Friday.

Pharrell
Image via Getty/Tim Mosenfelder
Pharrell

Zane Lowe routinely pulls out instaclassics for his World Record spotlight on Beats 1. On Wednesday, Lowe raised the World Record bar by dropping off a highly anticipated new one from N*E*R*D and Kendrick Lamar.

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"Don't Don't Do It!" appears on the first new N*E*R*D album in seven years, this month's NO_ONE EVER REALLY DIES. Speaking with Lowe Wednesday, just days before the album’s official release, Pharrell said the song first started coming together while he was watching a news report about the late Keith Lamont Scott.

"His wife is standing trying to get him, the authorities tell her to stand back," Pharrell, recalling his experience of seeing the footage of the police killing of Scott for the first time, said. "She's filming the entire thing on her camera phone. She is saying 'Don't do it. Don't don't do it. Don't do it, Keith. Don't, don't do it.' She’s telling the authorities that her husband has a TBI, that's a Traumatic Brain Injury. They're telling him to put his hands up or whatever and she knows, you can tell in her voice that she see what's going to happen. She's saying 'Don't do it. Don't do it Keith. Don't, don't do it.' And, of course, you know the way that turned out. He was killed."

Kendrick Lamar, Pharrell explained, was the perfect collaborative choice for this track. "Who better to enlist to help us communicate that feeling and that notion than Kendrick Lamar?" he said.

Listen to N*E*R*D and Kendrick Lamar's "Don't Don't Do It," featuring an intro penned by Frank Ocean, below.

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NO_ONE EVER REALLY DIES, which received a fittingly theatrical debut at this year's ComplexCon, arrives Dec. 15.

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