Chad Hugo is not letting Pharrell Williams become the whole story of The Neptunes. In a new court filing opposing Pharrell’s push to get his lawsuit thrown out, Hugo accuses his production partner of trying to rewrite the duo’s history with Hugo cut out of it.
Pharrell’s side has argued the case should be dismissed because Hugo’s complaint names only one song, EarthGang’s “U Gotta.” Hugo says that is nowhere near the full picture. According to the filing, the case covers compositions the two created across nearly 50 studio sessions between 2019 and 2021.
The problem, Hugo says, is that Pharrell and his companies control the session records needed to identify those songs. He says he asked for royalty statements and financial records from 2021 through 2024 and received almost nothing. He points to “U Gotta” as one example, saying he was removed from the track’s credits even though the artists on it acknowledged his work on it.
Pharrell’s team says that after three versions of the complaint, Hugo still has not clearly identified which songs or rights he is claiming, and that the case should not move forward. A hearing on the dismissal motion is set for November 6. The court has not ruled on any of it yet.
Hugo accuses Williams of trying to “rewrite history” and turn The Neptunes’ success into the work of one man.
It is a rough fight for anybody who grew up on their run. As The Neptunes, Hugo and Pharrell produced a huge share of the 2000s, from Nelly’s “Hot in Herre” and Kelis’s “Milkshake” to Jay-Z’s “Change Clothes” and Justin Timberlake’s “Rock Your Body.” The partnership has been cracking for a while: Hugo accused Pharrell of trying to trademark The Neptunes name without him in 2024, which Pharrell’s side denied, and Pharrell said that same year the two were no longer on speaking terms.
Thirty years after they started making music together as kids in Virginia Beach, the duo that produced everybody is now in court arguing over who gets credit for the work.
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