Rock DJ

About

Written by Robbie Williams, Guy Chambers, Kelvin Andrews, Nelson Pigford and Ekundayo Paris, Rock DJ was released on 31 July 2000 as the lead single from Sing When You’re Winning. It became Williams’ third UK number one, selling 200,000 copies in its first week and later achieving platinum status. The track topped charts in several countries including Ireland, Mexico and New Zealand and won multiple awards, among them Best British Single and Best Video at the 2001 BRIT Awards.

The song samples Barry White’s 1977 hit It’s Ecstasy When You Lay Down Next to Me, written by Pigford and Paris. Williams developed the track with Chambers and Stoke-on-Trent producers Kelvin Andrews and Danny Spencer, who had previously remixed for Sister Sledge and Aretha Franklin. The single marked a return to beat-driven pop after the ballads of his previous album.

There were about three or four drafts of what it was going to become and I wasn’t happy with any of them. I wasn’t happy with what we came up with in the end because I didn’t know what I wanted to convey. But as the deadline approached, that’s what we had — so that’s what we went with.Robbie Williams

Williams described Rock DJ as a “party song,” a counterpoint to the melancholy of the album’s other material. Its playful rap verses and tongue-in-cheek bravado became a signature of his live performances.

The video, directed by Vaughan Arnell, caused international controversy and established Williams’ image as a provocateur. Set in a futuristic roller-disco, it shows him stripping naked and peeling away his skin to gain attention from a female DJ. Featuring model Lauren Gold and special effects that won an MTV Video Music Award for Best Visual Effects, the video was banned from daytime television in several countries and entirely prohibited in the Dominican Republic.

I think this video was another tipping point for who I was going to be as a personality or as an entertainer. Looking back now, those were the videos that did it.Robbie Williams

Despite mixed feelings about the song itself, Rock DJ remains one of Williams’ defining releases, symbolising both his humour and his appetite for risk at the height of his pop fame.