MIAMI — Black Eyed Peas frontman, entrepreneur, and self-confessed “car guy” Will.i.am has launched a global Artist in Residence program with Formula 1 — but not everybody is on board.
The partnership kicked off at the Miami Grand Prix with a pre-race ceremony more closely resembling the NBA All-Star Weekend than a traditional motorsport event, proving divisive among the drivers and fans alike.
The rapper also dropped his first track, aptly titled “The Formula,” with Lil Wayne during the race weekend.
He will release two more F1-inspired songs throughout the season, culminating in a new solo album slated for the fall.
Will.i.am pitched the concept to F1 CEO Stefano Domenicali last November as an initiative that will continue with a new artist every year.
“He was speaking at Harvard when I was attending Harvard [Business School] and I pitched the idea to him there,” Will.i.am told The Post.
“It’s something that could happen for the rest of F1 where we have the arts celebrate the sport in ways that no sport [has done] before.”
Domenicali’s response to the outlandish pitch?
“That sounds like a really freaking awesome idea,” Will.i.am recalled of his conversation with the F1 boss, whom he’s known “for a long time.”
The “Scream & Shout” chart-topper is no stranger to the international sporting stage, having previously written a theme song for the NBA playoffs, and performed at the Super Bowl and the World Cup.
But this collaboration is “deeper,” he told us.
“To put out a record and go on tour with a sport as it travels the whole world … that doesn’t happen,” he said, noting he’s set to perform at a handful of races throughout the year, in addition to releasing a full album.
However, the residency program’s first showing in Miami resulted in a highly ‘meme-able’ moment when all 20 drivers were blasted with smoke while being introduced by rapper LL Cool J.
Mercedes driver George Russell slammed the whole affair as “distracting.”
“I’m here to race, I’m not here for the show. I’m here to drive and I’m here to win,” he told reporters.
His teammate, Lewis Hamilton, was more complimentary of the American-style pageantry, which also featured Will.i.am conducting an orchestra on the starting grid.
“I think it’s cool that the sport is continuously growing and evolving and they’re not just doing the same stuff that they’ve done in the past,” he said.
“They’re trying new things. They’re trying to improve the show always and I’m in full support of it.”
Other critics took to social media, including one user who tweeted, “The torrent of hate for Will.i.am’s crime against music with ‘The Formula’ is hilarious, as people finally realize that turning our niche sport into a hyped-up circus for the casual masses may not be such a good idea.”
But Will.i.am is adamant the arts will be “a bridge to communicate” with new F1 fans, many of whom discovered the sport through social media or Netflix’s hit docuseries, “Drive To Survive,” during the COVID-19 lockdown.
“The ‘new fan’ probably doesn’t know anything about the race. They know Lewis, they might know Max [Verstappen]. Those are the only two people they know,” Will.i.am said.
“They don’t know the engineers and they don’t know the details of how someone wins the race, so some education needs to go into that new fan.”
The “Boom Boom Pow” hitmaker suggested people were “flocking” to the sport purely for “the vibe.”
“But the vibe … is not enough to keep them,” he said.
“I remember playing the Singapore Grand Prix and there’s like 100,000 people in the audience watching the show, but it wasn’t broadcast. If this was the Super Bowl, it would all be broadcast. And F1 has 23 Super Bowls every single year, but they haven’t stitched those two worlds [together]. The residency program is the first step to address that.”
