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On the New Zealand Singles Chart, "Happy" debuted at No. 11 on December 23, 2013.

The next week it


moved to No. 2. Then on January 6, 2014, "Happy" began a 12-week consecutive reign in the No. 1
position, right up until March 24, 2014. It then dropped to No. 2 for one week, then spent a further
three weeks at No. 1, bringing the total number of weeks at No. 1 to fifteen, breaking the 36-year-long
record for most weeks spent at No. 1, previously held by Boney M.'s "Rivers of Babylon".[37][38] As of
February 22, 2015, "Happy" had spent 62 straight weeks in the New Zealand Top 40 since its debut,
before finally dropping out of the chart the following week. The song has been certified 6× Platinum in
New Zealand.[37][39]

United States[edit]

"Happy" reached the top of the US Billboard Hot 100 for the week ending March 8, 2014, giving Williams
his fourth No. 1 single on the chart, but his first as lead artist. It took twelve years and a week (as the
issue date is March 8, 2014) to achieve his first Hot 100 No. 1 hit as a lead artist.[40] The song remained
at No. 1 the following week, and also topped the Hot 100 Airplay chart.[41] The song also holds the
record for the second-highest audience peak for a week on the Hot 100 Airplay, with 225.9 million
impressions while Robin Thicke's "Blurred Lines", a song in which Pharrell was featured as well as
produced and co-wrote, holds the all-time record.[42] The song remained at the No. 1 position longer
than any other song in the calendar year. The single passed its 4 million sales mark in April 2014, the first
song of 2014 to do so.[43]

On the week of May 17, 2014, after spending ten weeks at the summit, "Happy" was finally knocked off
of number one by John Legend's "All of Me" down to the No. 2 spot.[44] "Happy" became the 28th song
in the history of the chart to reach this milestone.[45] It spent a total of 22 weeks in the top 10, entering
on the week-ending February 15, 2014 and departing on July 19, 2014. The song sold 5,633,000 copies in
the US in the first six months of 2014, the most ever of any song in the first six months of any calendar
year.[46] It was also the best-selling song of 2014 in the US with 6.45 million copies sold for the year,[3]
and has sold over 6.9 million total copies in the US as of April 2015.[47]

Other charts[edit]

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The song also topped the charts of 22 other countries, including Australia, Austria, Canada, France,
Germany, Ireland, Italy, Poland and Spain. It has spent twelve weeks (including seven consecutive) at No.
1 in Ireland,[48] making it the third song in less than a year to spend more than seven weeks at No. 1,
after Robin Thicke's "Blurred Lines" and Avicii's "Wake Me Up!". In France, "Happy" spent 22 weeks at
No. 1, the longest reign at the top of the Syndicat National de l'Edition Phonographique, beating Lou
Bega's "Mambo No. 5", which spent 20 weeks at No. 1 in 1999.

Music video[edit]

To coincide with the single release, the website 24hoursofhappy.com was launched, featuring a visual
presentation of "Happy", which was advertised as being "the world's first 24-hour music video." The
video was shot by steadicam operator Jon Beattie,[49] its creative director was Yoann Lemoine[50] and
its director the French directing team We Are from LA.[51] It consists of the four-minute song repeated
multiple times, with various people dancing around Los Angeles and miming along. The website allows
users to navigate to various points in the 24-hour timeframe, including all 360 four-minute
segments.[52]

Williams himself appears 24 times in the day-long video, once at the start of each hour. There are a
number of celebrity cameos in the video, including Whit Hertford, Kelly Osbourne, Rob Zabrecky, Magic
Johnson, Urijah Faber, Sérgio Mendes, Jimmy Kimmel, Odd Future, Steve Carell (who plays Gru in
Despicable Me 2), Jamie Foxx, Ana Ortiz, Miranda Cosgrove (who plays Margo in Despicable Me 2),
Gavin DeGraw and JoJo.[53] The minions from Despicable Me 2 make several appearances throughout
the film, including one scene at 3:00 am, in which Pharrell Williams and the minions dance in a movie
theatre that is playing the scene from Despicable Me 2 in which "Happy" appears. A lone, one-eyed
minion also appears dancing to song in its entirety at 4:40 pm.

An official four-minute edit of the video was also released onto YouTube on November 21, 2013, and as
of November 2017 has had over 990 million views.[54] It was nominated for Best Male Video and Video
of the Year at the 2014 MTV Video Music Awards.[7][8] The 24-hour music video for "Happy" was also
projected at the Buenos Aires International Festival of Independent Cinema in April 2014.[55]

"Happy" tribute videos[edit]

The original video spawned many cover videos on YouTube in which people from different cities
throughout the world dance to the song. Those videos are usually called "Pharrell Williams – Happy –
We Are from [name of the city]".[56] As of May 2014, more than 1,500 videos have been created.
Inspired by this global phenomenon, a French couple launched a website wearehappyfrom.com to
showcase the remakes.[57]
In April 2014, the Embassy of the United States, Yerevan, Armenia released a video titled "Happy
Yerevan", directed by Artyom Abovyan featuring US ambassador John A. Heffern and several Armenian
celebrities, such as singers André, Emmy and Aram Mp3.[58][59] The same month artsmedia Albania
produced a music video for the track featuring inhabitants of Tirana. The video soon became viral in
Albania and caused controversy over the usage of images of Albanian First Secretary Enver Hoxha.[60]

In May 2014, a group of Iranian fans who created a tribute to "Happy" were arrested.[61][62][63][64]
According to a police chief, the song represented vulgarity and also hurt public chastity. Williams
responded to the arrest in a tweet stating "It's beyond sad these kids were arrested for trying to spread
happiness."[65] Soon after Iran's President Hassan Rouhani criticized the arrest when he tweeted
"#Happiness is our people's right. We shouldn't be too hard on behaviours caused by joy."[66] The
dancers, along with the director,[67] were later released. It was reported on September 19, 2014 that
seven of the individuals in the Iranian video had been handed suspended punishments of 91 lashes each
along with jail sentences by Iranian courts. The result of the suspended sentence is that if another crime
is committed in the next three years, then the punishments will be carried out.[68]

Credits and personnel[edit]

Recording[2]

Recorded at Circle House Studios, Miami, Florida

Mixed at Music Box Studios, Atlanta, Georgia

Personnel[2]

Pharrell Williams – lead vocals, keyboards, drums, bass guitar, writing, production

Rhea Dummett – backing vocals

Trevon Henderson – backing vocals

Ashley L. Lee – backing vocals

Shamika Hightower – backing vocals

Jasmine Murray – backing vocals


Terrence Rolle – backing vocals

Mike Larson – recording, digital editing, arrangement

Matthew Desrameaux – recording assistant

Ali Khazaee – cover art

Andrew Coleman – digital editing, arrangement

Leslie Brathwaite – mixer

Reuben Cohen – mastering

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