Pharrell Williams is pretty busy trying to finish that long-awaited fourth N.E.R.D. album, but he still hasn’t quit his other job as a producer, and has several interesting pop collaborations in the works. Besides working on new music for rappers like Nicki Minaj and Gucci Mane, Pharrell has also been in the studio working on the respective new albums of Ciara, Rihanna, and even Avril Lavigne.

“I just went in with T.I., just went in with Gucci Mane, Nicky Minaj, uh, Shay’s stuff, Avril Lavigne – all people who wanted to try different things. Ciara, Rihanna…” {source}

Rihanna and Ciara aren’t much of a surprise, but Avril? The pop-rock superstar’s been working on her fourth studio album all year now, which according to her, will be “acoustic, raw” and “stripped back”. Since making those statements, the album has been pushed back multiple times, and the last time we saw Avril she was in the studio with Hip-Hop producer Alex Da Kid. Now she’s working with Pharrell. I said this in my last Avril post, and I’ll say it again now: My bet is that Avril’s new direction wasn’t commercial enough, especially in today’s dance-driven marketplace, so now her label have stuck her in the studio with urban producers to try and cook up a few hit singles. Anyway, it should be interesting, regardless.

As for Rihanna, The Neptunes worked with her on Rated R, but their tracks didn’t make the final cut. Ciara has also clocked in studio time with the pair, which resulted in one of the best non-singles of her whole career, “I Proceed”, from her sophomore album, The Evolution. I can’t wait to see what they’ve done this time around.

In case you couldn’t tell by the title, I’ve decided to start doing a new weekly remix post. There are so many hot remixes and mashups of all our favorite tunes out there that deserve to get a little shine, so every week I’ll be posting the hottest remix that I can find, which you can all then marvel at and praise.

If you know of any hot remixes out there that you think deserve a post then TWEET it to me.

First up is the Justin Michael & Kemal Mix of Ciara’s urban smash “Ride”, which turns the song from a crunk hood hit into a killer club track. The mix is official too, commissioned directly by CiCi’s label. Since she’s not targeting the pop charts as much these days, it’d be great to get some more official dance mixes of her singles to send out to the clubs and to give the pop fans something to get down to.

Check out the song, complete with an amazingly edited video, below.

There was some hazy footage of Ciara’s recent show at the Power Live concert floating around the web yesterday, but now a much better video has surfaced online thanks to RealTalkNY.

For her set, Princess Super Ci performed her mixtape track “Pretty Girl Swag”, her new single “Gimmie Dat” and her urban smash “Ride”. These days, Ciara obviously knows what her fans want to see from her, so she brought out her trademark choreography and busted out all the moves for the first two songs, before slowing things down for a raunchy grind-off during the finale, “Ride”.

She did the majority of it all singing live, too.

Now we just have to hope that we get to see some of these moves on TV or an awards show soon.

It’s been a lonely five days since my last update on my homegirl Ciara, so I’ve compiled a tiny and somewhat pointless list to let you know just what the singer-with-the-model-swag has been up to.

• Snatched wigs and made that thing go Blauw during a recent Chanel-clad shopping trip in Manhattan [Pics via UltimateCiara]
• “Ride” fell from 3-7 last week on the R&B chart. [Stupid Billboard charts]
• Put some red tips in her weave. [Bathe in her defining glamor here]
• Was molested, violated and humiliated by Gay Songz live on stage, but was too polite to do anything about it [Via Billboard]
• Heard her new single “Speechless” played on the radio — most likely wants you to request it. [She Tweeted it]
• Uploaded “Speechless” and “Gimmie Dat” onto her YouTube account. ["Speechless" has way more views so far]
• Stacked that international paper by performing in $pain. [No video footage has leaked yet]
• Released a webisode to promote Basic Instinct. Plans to release more. [Watch it]
• Continues to own and slay with her cute and classic Evolution cut “C.R.U.S.H.” [Bless your ears with it]

The webisode wasn’t nearly as exciting as I was hoping, but it does have some performance footage and her cute dog Tyson is in it, so you must watch.

I think Basic Instinct comes out early October. Now, don’t be a hater and go request her two new saaangles on radio.

Ciara has released the official artwork for the second of her two new dual singles, “Speechless”.

The-Dream & Tricky-produced song originally leaked with The-Dream as a featured vocalist, but the final version is just solo CiCi.

Earlier in the week, Ciara also released an alternative cover for her other single, “Gimmie Dat”, which you can see below.

Time to get to work CiCi…

It turns out that “Gimmie That” isn’t the only new single that Ciara will be releasing, with CiCi announcing that her already-leaked song “Speechless” featuring The-Dream will also receive the single treatment. Music video’s for both tracks are already being prepared, so it looks likely that “Gimmie Dat” and “Speechless” will be released as a double A-Side. {source}

As I mentioned in my last Ciara post, CiCi’s first single “Ride” has been doing exceptionally well since it’s release, reaching a brand new peak of #3 on the R&B/Hip-Hop chart this week, despite a BET video ban and lack of promotion. The high chart placing actually makes it Ciara’s most successful R&B single since her hit “Promise”, which hit No. 1 back in 2006.

Finally, Ciara’s team seem to be getting things right. “Gimmie Dat” has the potential to make a significant impact on the Hot 100, while “Speechless” can cater towards the urban crowd. The success of “Ride” proves that people are checking for R&B midtempos from Ciara, so “Speechless” is the perfect follow-up single and should do quite well on urban radio.

Things are finally look up for Ciara!

It was originally intended to be a buzz single, but now Ciara and her label have made it official by selecting “Gimmie Dat” as the second single from CiCi’s upcoming fourth album Basic Instinct.

“Gimmie Dat” is the follow-up to Ciara’s hit “Ride”, which just this week reached #3 on the R&B/Hip-Hop singles chart — a new peak.

While Basic Instinct is currently without a release date, the strong success of “Ride” is a nice indication that there isn’t too much to worry about at this stage. Well, except the lack of promotion, but according to Ciara, that’s about to change with a series of radio and TV promo dates that have been penciled in.

Gimme gimme gimme gimme gimme dat bass!

After online speculation, Billboard have confirmed that Ciara’s upcoming fourth album Basic Instinct will now arrive in stores on October 5th.

In a new article published on Billboard.com, “Ride” producer Tricky Stewart has discussed the unexpected success of the single, as well as Ciara’s impending comeback.

“The track has caught on because it’s infectious, memorable and returns Ciara to her fan base,” Stewart says. “The last album we had a number of people in our ears not believing in our vision. This time Ciara drew the line and really fought for what she believed in.”

Good move. Ciara definitely needed more time to release another single, and to promote and perform. Bring on “Gimmie Dat”.

While some female artists are busy fending off claims of fraudulent songwriting, R&B entertainer Ciara certainly isn’t one of them. Many people don’t know that Ciara first got her break in the music industry by inking a publishing deal, and now in a new interview with the UK’s Metro, she’s opening up about her time as a writer.

What’s the difference between writing songs for yourself and writing for other people?

“You need to take their personalities into account and use your imagination if you don’t know them. It’s a fun creative challenge. It can be very liberating. I did some things for the Disney Channel. It was younger and cheesier than stuff I’d do for myself but it was for a much younger market.”

She was also asked about the lessons she’s learned from the notoriously harsh music industry — something she should know all too well after the public and media gave her the Christina Aguilera Bionic treatment during her Fantasy Ride album era.

You’ve been performing since you were 14. What lessons has the music industry taught you?

“It’s taught me to be quick and tough and has made me strong. It can be an aggressive world and there are some shrewd operators behind the scenes. It’s taught me to be less emotional about making certain decisions. This industry prepares you for anything. If you can do well in this business, you can do anything.”

Yes, there certainly are some very shrewd operators out there. Not naming names.

Oh, and we can’t forget about CiCi’s upcoming fourth studio album Basic Instinct.

“It’s back to basics, I executive produced it. It’s for my fans, giving them what they want. It’s about happiness and fun and energy.

“My last album had an extreme creative presentation. I’ve always had an aggressive undertone but I think they just want to dance and feel some of that energy from when I was doing Goodies.”

With no performances of “Ride” and the premiere of Basic Instinct’s second single “Gimme That”, I’m getting the feeling that “Ride” was like an unofficial warm-up single. Ciara is probably hoping for some big crossover success with “Gimme That”, which is much faster paced and universal sounding, and could work in a similar vein to Usher’s “OMG’.

Who knows, Ciara could surprise us all and actually end up doing quite well from this Basic Instinct project. She’s got the talent, the album leaks so far have all been generally pretty hot and “Ride” has surprisingly done very well all things considered.

Ciara has fulfilled her promise to return to the dance floor on her second single, turning the tempo up to an all time high on “Gimme Dat”, the latest release from her upcoming Basic Instinct album.

“The princess is back in town,I finna put on my crown,” she brags on the Tricky Stewart and Soundz production, “I’ve been gone for too long, I think it’s time I bring it back”. It’s almost hard to call this song a return to form though, since besides maybe “Get Up”, CiCi has never done a track this incredibly fast paced for a single. “Gimme Dat” is a certified dance floor killer, and shows Ciara creating the perfect club track without having to resort to electro-pop.

After the surprising success that “Ride” has had, It’ll be interesting to see if “Gimme Dat” can go even higher when given some proper promotion.

Look out for Basic Instinct on August 17.

With Ciara’s new single “Ride” climbing up the charts with no promotion and a BET video ban, CiCi is now feeling confident enough with her new album ‘Basic Instinct‘ to move its release forward by one week.

Not only that, but Ciara is also promising to finally begin promoting and performing the song properly.

“With the success of my single ‘Ride’, the video, everything, we’ve decided to put out my album EARLIER! We want for you to have the music we’ve been working so hard on earlier! Yes! Let the promo begin! It’s time for you to see me perform ‘Ride’! It’s time for me to hit the stage! It’s time for us to have fun baby!” {source}

The sooner, the better, I say. Ciara’s known for having problems with leaked records, and she certainly didn’t want to go up against Katy Perry on August 24, so August 17 is a perfect date.

Check out a new promo video Ciara released below. It’s her doing a verse over Waka Flocka’s “Hard In The Paint”, with a shoutout for her fans at the end.

Amazon.com have listed Ciara’s upcoming fourth LP ‘Basic Instinct‘ as due for release on August 10, finally providing the album with the release date that Ciara herself has been so reluctant to provide.

If the news of the release date proves to be accurate, it’s a good sign for Ciara, indicating that her team are confident enough with the current performance of “Ride” on the R&B charts and the potential of her upcoming second single to make ‘Basic Instinct‘ more concrete.

Expect production from The-Dream & Tricky when the album hits stores this August.

Are you excited?

EDIT: Amazon have now changed the release date to August 24′ – the same day as Katy Perry’s ‘Teenage Dream’ album.