"Get Ur Freak On" is a hip hop

Hip hop music

Hip hop music, also called hip-hop, rap music or hip-hop music, is a musical genre consisting of a stylized rhythmic music that commonly accompanies rapping, a rhythmic and rhyming speech that is chanted...

 song written by American

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 rapper/singer Missy Elliott

Missy Elliott

Melissa Arnette "Missy" Elliott , is an American rapper, singer-songwriter, record producer, and actressA five-time Grammy Award winner, Elliott, with record sales of over seven million in the United States, is the only female rapper to have five albums certified platinum by the RIAA, including one...

 and her producer Tim "Timbaland" Mosley

Timbaland

Timothy Zachery Mosley , better known by his stage name Timbaland, is an American record producer, songwriter and rapper....

 for Elliott's third studio album Miss E... So Addictive. Released as the album's first single in 2001, the track reached #7 on the Billboard Hot 100

Billboard Hot 100

The Billboard Hot 100 is the United States music industry standard singles popularity chart issued weekly by Billboard magazine. Chart rankings are based on radio play and sales; the tracking-week for sales begins on Monday and ends on Sunday, while the radio play tracking-week runs from Wednesday...

 chart, becoming Missy Elliott's fifth most successful single to date. The song was her first solo top ten hit in the United Kingdom

United Kingdom

The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

, peaking at #4 there, spending six weeks inside the top 20. A remix of the song featuring Nelly Furtado

Nelly Furtado

Nelly Kim Furtado is a Canadian singer-songwriter, record producer and actress. Furtado grew up in Victoria, British Columbia, Canada.Furtado first gained fame with her debut album, Whoa, Nelly!, and its single "I'm Like a Bird", which won a 2001 Juno Award for Single of the Year and a 2002 Grammy...

 was a dance club hit during this period.

The song's beat is based on bhangra, a popular music and dance form from the Punjab

Punjab region

The Punjab , also spelled Panjab |water]]s"), is a geographical region straddling the border between Pakistan and India which includes Punjab province in Pakistan and the states of the Punjab, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Chandigarh and some northern parts of the National Capital Territory of Delhi...

 state of India

India

India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...

. The six-note base of the song is a Punjabi

Punjabi people

The Punjabi people , ਪੰਜਾਬੀ ), also Panjabi people, are an Indo-Aryan group from South Asia. They are the second largest of the many ethnic groups in South Asia. They originate in the Punjab region, which has been been the location of some of the oldest civilizations in the world including, the...

 melody played on a tumbi

Tumbi

The Tumbi or Toombi is a traditional North Indian instrument from Punjab. The tumbi was invented and popularized by the renowned folk-singer of Punjab "Lal Chand Yamla Jatt". In the 1960s, 70s and 80s most of the Punjabi singers used the Tumbi...

, a stringed Indian instrument. This tune was also utilized in Bubba Sparxx's debut single "Ugly", in which Elliott makes a cameo in the video.

In December, the song was listed as number 14 in Rolling Stone

Rolling Stone

Rolling Stone is a US-based magazine devoted to music, liberal politics, and popular culture that is published every two weeks. Rolling Stone was founded in San Francisco in 1967 by Jann Wenner and music critic Ralph J...

's "Best Songs of the Decade", and later at 466 in their The 500 Greatest Songs of All Time

The 500 Greatest Songs of All Time

"The 500 Greatest Songs of All Time" was the cover story of a special issue of Rolling Stone, issue number 963, published December 9, 2004, a year after the magazine published its list of "The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time"....

updated list of 2010. The song also lists at #7 on Pitchfork Media

Pitchfork Media

Pitchfork Media, usually known simply as Pitchfork or P4k, is a Chicago-based daily Internet publication established in 1995 that is devoted to music criticism and commentary, music news, and artist interviews. Its focus is on underground and independent music, especially indie rock...

's "Top 500 Songs of the 2000's" and #16 on VH1's "Greatest Songs of Hip-Hop". In 2011, NME

NME

The New Musical Express is a popular music publication in the United Kingdom, published weekly since March 1952. It started as a music newspaper, and gradually moved toward a magazine format during the 1980s, changing from newsprint in 1998. It was the first British paper to include a singles...

placed it at number 17 on its list "150 Best Tracks of the Past 15 Years". It was also used in The Simpsons

The Simpsons

The Simpsons is an American animated sitcom created by Matt Groening for the Fox Broadcasting Company. The series is a satirical parody of a middle class American lifestyle epitomized by its family of the same name, which consists of Homer, Marge, Bart, Lisa and Maggie...

 episode "Ice Cream of Margie (with the Light Blue Hair)

Ice Cream of Margie (With the Light Blue Hair)

"Ice Cream of Margie " is the seventh episode of The Simpsons eighteenth season, originally airing on the Fox network in the United States on November 26, 2006. In the episode, Homer gets fired from the nuclear power plant and takes over an ice cream truck business, while a depressed Marge creates...

".

At the beginning of the song, a man says in Japanese

Japanese language

is a language spoken by over 130 million people in Japan and in Japanese emigrant communities. It is a member of the Japonic language family, which has a number of proposed relationships with other languages, none of which has gained wide acceptance among historical linguists .Japanese is an...

: "Kore kara minna de mechakucha odotte. Sawagou, sawagou". Translating into English, it reads: "Everyone start dancing together wildly now. Let's make some noise, let's make some noise." Before the second chorus (after Missy says "Let me show you some") another man is heard saying in Hindi: "Aaj mujh ko..., translating to "Today, to me..."(can also translate to "hurry to me"). The outro of the song features the Japanese man saying "Ichi ni san shi", translating to "One, two, three, four."

UK Single

12" Special Edition

1. "Get Ur Freak On" (Superchumbo's Superfreakon Remix) - 8:53

CD Maxi-Single

1. "Get Ur Freak On" (Edit) - 3:31
2. "Get Ur Freak On" (Amended Version) - 3:57
3. "Get Ur Freak On" (Instrumental) - 3:53

US Single

12" Single
Side A

1. "Get Ur Freak On" (Album Version) - 3:57
2. "Get Ur Freak On" (Amended Version) - 3:57

Side B

1. "Get Ur Freak On" (Instrumental) - 3:53
2. "Get Ur Freak On" (Acapella) - 3:10
3. "Get Ur Freak On" (TV Track) - 3:58

CD Promo

1. "Get Ur Freak On" (Amended Version)
2. "Get Ur Freak On" (Edit)
3. "Get Ur Freak On" (Album Version)
4. "Get Ur Freak On" (Instrumental)
5. "Get Ur Freak On" (TV Track)
6. "Get Ur Freak On" (Amended Acapella)

German Single

12" Single
Side A

1. "Get Ur Freak On" (Edit) - 3:31
2. "Get Ur Freak On" (Album Version) - 3:57

Side B

1. "Get Ur Freak On" (Instrumental) - 3:53
2. "Get Ur Freak On" (Acapella) - 3:11
3. "Get Ur Freak On" (TV Track) - 3:50

Charts

Chart	Peak Position
U.S. Billboard Hot 100 Billboard Hot 100 The Billboard Hot 100 is the United States music industry standard singles popularity chart issued weekly by Billboard magazine. Chart rankings are based on radio play and sales; the tracking-week for sales begins on Monday and ends on Sunday, while the radio play tracking-week runs from Wednesday...	7
U.S. Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs, is a chart released weekly by Billboard in the United States.The chart, initiated in 1942, is used to track the success of popular music songs in urban, or primarily African American, venues. Dominated over the years at various times by jazz, rhythm and blues, doo-wop, soul,...	3
U.S. Hot Rap Singles	7
Dutch Singles Chart	9
UK Singles Chart UK Singles Chart The UK Singles Chart is compiled by The Official Charts Company on behalf of the British record-industry. The full chart contains the top selling 200 singles in the United Kingdom based upon combined record sales and download numbers, though some media outlets only list the Top 40 or the Top 75 ...	4
New Zealand Singles Chart	7
Canadian Singles Chart Canadian Singles Chart The Canadian Singles Chart is currently compiled by the U.S.-based music sales tracking company, Nielsen SoundScan . The chart is compiled every Wednesday, and is published by Jam! Canoe on Thursdays....	12
UK Dance Chart UK Dance Chart The UK Dance Chart is a chart compiled by The Official Charts Company from sales in record stores and digital downloads. Although the chart does not currently receive any airplay on the radio or television, the chart can be viewed on the BBC Radio 1 and The Official Charts Company website.Digital...	1

Other versions

The official remix of this song features Nelly Furtado

Nelly Furtado

Nelly Kim Furtado is a Canadian singer-songwriter, record producer and actress. Furtado grew up in Victoria, British Columbia, Canada.Furtado first gained fame with her debut album, Whoa, Nelly!, and its single "I'm Like a Bird", which won a 2001 Juno Award for Single of the Year and a 2002 Grammy...

 was used both in the soundtrack and in the background of the movie Lara Croft: Tomb Raider

Lara Croft: Tomb Raider

Lara Croft: Tomb Raider is a 2001 adventure thriller film adapted from the Tomb Raider video game series. Directed by Simon West and starring Angelina Jolie as Lara Croft, it was released in U.S. theaters on June 15, 2001. The film was a commercial success...

.

Covers

In 2005, Scottish acoustic rocker KT Tunstall

KT Tunstall

Kate Victoria "KT" Tunstall is a Scottish singer-songwriter and guitarist from St Andrews, Scotland. She broke into the public eye with a 2004 live solo performance of her song "Black Horse and the Cherry Tree" on Later... with Jools Holland...

 released her version of "Get Ur Freak On" performed for BBC Radio

BBC Radio

BBC Radio is a service of the British Broadcasting Corporation which has operated in the United Kingdom under the terms of a Royal Charter since 1927. For a history of BBC radio prior to 1927 see British Broadcasting Company...

 Live Lounge

Live Lounge

The Live Lounge is a segment on the British radio station BBC Radio 1. Originally hosted by Jo Whiley on her mid-morning radio show and now hosted by Fearne Cotton, it exhibits well-known artists usually performing one song of their own and one by another artist, in an acoustic format...

 on certain versions of the single for Suddenly I See

Suddenly I See

"Suddenly I See" is a song by British singer-songwriter KT Tunstall and is featured on her debut album, Eye to the Telescope. It was released on 29 August 2005 as the third single from the album, charting at #12 in the UK Singles Chart . The single was a hit in Australia where it charted at #6 on...

.

American rock band Eels

Eels (band)

Eels is an American indie rock band formed by singer/songwriter Mark Oliver Everett, better known as E...

 also released a version of "Get Ur Freak On" on Meet the Eels: Essential Eels Vol. I having frequently performed it live during the Shootenanny!

Shootenanny!

Shootenanny! is a 2003 studio album by Eels. The name comes from a neologism coined by Eels front-man, Mark Oliver Everett, for "a social gathering at which participants engage in folk singing and sometimes dancing [a hootenanny], but mostly the shooting of guns.""Saturday Morning" was released...

tour several years previously.

By Shawn Lee's Ping Pong Orchestra in the album Hit the Hits.