Pharrell Williams says the coronavirus pandemic “is a plague we’re living through at the moment”

He also believes that "life is going to have a different kind of gravity than it’s ever had before"

Pharrell Williams has described the coronavirus pandemic as “a plague we’re living through at the moment”, while also voicing his view that there won’t be “a new normal” once the virus outbreak eventually subsides.

The musician and producer addressed the health crisis in a new interview with Kanye West that has been published this week by i-D.

After West asked whether they should discuss the coronavirus outbreak, Williams replied that “we need to be clear that this is a plague we’re living through at the moment”.

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“I don’t think there will be such a thing as ‘a new normal’ – it doesn’t do enough justice to the difference in who we were pre-pandemic and who we will be moving forward,” he said. “I think it’s made a lot of people very wary and on edge. Life’s going to have a different kind of gravity than it’s ever had before.

Kanye West and Pharrell
Pharrell was speaking to Kanye West in the new interview (Picture: Taylor Hill/FilmMagic)

“It’s also gonna make us really separated. We’re disconnecting from each other even though online we’re probably more connected than we’ve ever been. It’s a bit like the Tower of Babel, if you will. We’ve never been this close, and there’s a lot of advantages that come with that. There’s a lot of disadvantages, too, and a lot of grey areas.”

Pharrell continued by adding that “love is going to be a very deep emotion” after the pandemic, especially as social distancing measures mean that “you can’t just shake a hand or hug a person and exchange that feeling in a way you could before.”

“And then, look at things economically: regardless of whatever ways stabilisation reveals itself – not normality, but stabilisation – because like a wave it’s gotta stabilise at some point, and when that does, there’s nothing normal about looking around and seeing so many businesses closed and so many people without jobs.”

Williams did also voice some optimism, saying: “We have been through many plagues before. We have been through pandemics. We survived. We’re gonna make it. In a lot of ways we got ourselves into this, we gotta get to work to get through it.”

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Back in April, Williams’ single ‘Happy’ topped a list of the most-played tracks of the 2010s.

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