Songfacts®:

• This is the title song from the soundtrack of Illumination Entertainment's computer-animated 3-D feature film Despicable Me. The tune was written and recorded by American recording artist Pharrell Williams, who is one half of the record production duo, The Neptunes. He is also the lead vocalist and drummer of rock band N.E.R.D.
• Williams told Artist Direct the story behind this song: "I was standing there with the C.E.O. of Illumination Entertainment Chris Meledandri, Kathy Nelson and my manager. Chris told me that he really needed something that summed up the picture and the character of Gru all at once. All of a sudden, I just started thinking about bad L.A. traffic [Laughs]."
• Kathy Nelson, Universal Pictures' music director, previously worked with Williams on the The Fast And The Furious (2001), which boasted a soundtrack largely produced by the Neptunes, and the franchise's third film, The Fast And The Furious: Tokyo Drift (2006).
  
  When Williams, a self-professed child at heart, learned that Nelson tasked Jack Johnson to write music for the 2006 animated film Curious George, he felt betrayed.
  
  "I was hurt. I was like, 'Why wouldn't you ask me? You ask me for hip-hop records but you don't ask me to do this," Williams is quoted in a 2010 article on theneptunes.org.
  
  Nelson took note, and a peace offering came in the form of Despicable Me, with Williams co-composing the score with Heitor Pereira and writing songs like the title theme.
• The story follows supervillain Gru and his Minions' diabolical plot to steal the moon. Williams was curious about the origin of Gru's toxic traits, and that curiosity informed the songs he wrote about the despicable character.
  
  "When you look at Gru, you understand that he is a guy that has issues," said Williams. "Personalities are weathered entities, if you will, that have been weathered by their environs, their parents, things that have happened to them. Basically, we are all walking molds. You can look at us and tell what we've been through and where we've come from, how it has affected us and how we are carrying it with us today. Gru was much like that. He was so mean but he also had a lot of fun. And I thought at first that he had this 'Grinch' type of feel but then you realized that the Grinch just did it to be dastardly. Gru did it because he thought it was the way, it was the way he was treated as a child…It was the way he saw his mother behave with him."
• Williams also signed on for the subsequent movies in the Despicable Me series, and wrote the smash hit "Happy" for the 2013 sequel, Despicable Me 2.